


The devil you know

by Adrenalineshots



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: AU version, Angst, Blindness, Dealing With Loss, Gen, Hurt Malcolm Bright, surprise twist, this story is not what it seems
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-01
Updated: 2020-06-01
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:29:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 22,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24477973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Adrenalineshots/pseuds/Adrenalineshots
Summary: Malcolm wakes up alone, in the hospital, faced with terrible news. As he deals with the life altering effects of what happened, he realizes that life can throw you more than one curve ball at a time.
Comments: 35
Kudos: 49
Collections: Prodigal Whump Fic Exchange - Spring 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ceterisparibus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ceterisparibus/gifts).



> Ceterisparibus wanted something with whump, preferably of the psychological flavor, Malcolm being loved and supported and Ainsley being given the attention that she deserves. Somehow, this came out! I hope you enjoy it! I know I did!
> 
> I owe a huge thank you to the wonderful Sonshineandshowers for beta-reading this mess. She was an absolute delight to work with and such a precious help! Thank you, you are a true gift!!
> 
> To the amazing Jameena, who set the wheels in motion and organized all of this, the biggest of hugs! You’re amazing!

Malcolm took a deep breath, like a man breaking the surface of the ocean after an eternity spent under the water.

  
  


He opened his eyes, thirsty not only for oxygen, but some answers.

  
  


“Take it easy,” a complete stranger's voice beckoned of him. “You've been unconscious for quite some time... try to ease your breathing... calm down.”

  
  


Bright looked around, ignoring the annoying, disjointed voice. He couldn't remember what had happened, where he was and who that person was. Also, the room was so dark that it was making his skin crawl with anxiety. He couldn't see a damn thing. “Who are you? Where am I? Can you turn on the lights, please?”

  
  


There was a slight pause, a moment of silence almost impossible to quantify. “You're at the hospital,” the man informed him. “My name is Brian and I'm your attending nurse for this shift,” he went on, fumbling with what sounded like monitor buttons before hastily scribbling some notes on a notepad. “Let me get your doctor in here and she can answer the rest of your questions, okay?”

  
  


Malcolm swallowed. His brain felt fuzzy, filled with cotton. Still, a part of him that never truly turned off registered the hurried tone in the man's words, the barely there high pitch of his tone, the way his tennis shoes scuffed against the floor as he scurried away. He was nervous, lying about something.

  
  


The nurse left, leaving the room empty, a black hole of darkness that sucked all the oxygen from the air and pushed Malcolm against his bed, suffocating him.

  
  


The profiler sat up, the mattress fluttering under his touch like it was made of water. He grasped the sheets tightly, willing the dizziness to pass. What the hell was going on?

He raised one hand, the one not encumbered with IV lines and oxygen sensors, and felt the itchy stubble on his face. It was longer than usual, almost a full beard. How long had he been there?

Was he even in a hospital? When the only proof he had were the words of a skittish stranger and the noises around him, the profiler figured that he could easily be anywhere else, other than a hospital. Had he been taken by someone? There were no restrains and the man hadn't locked the door when he left, but that didn't prove a single thing.

He could barely remember what case they had been working on...something about a cop killer?

  
  


His panic steadily rising, Malcolm looked around, searching the place for...something to prove where he really was. There should be some semblance of light in a hospital room. Light coming off the monitor, the edge of a door against bright corridors outside, the shape of a window with the blind down, something.

  
  


The smell was right though... he could not imagine a scenery where a killer would go to the trouble of mimicking the smell of a hospital room to trick his victims. Which meant that the absolute absence of light was real.

His heart sped up as Malcolm started to put pieces together, still refusing to look at the picture they formed. He didn't want to because the idea was too frightening, too inconceivable to accept.

  
  


The nurse had been fumbling with the monitor, scribbling notes on his pad. He couldn't have done that if the room had been in the complete darkness that Malcolm was perceiving.

  
  


Which could only mean one thing.

  
  


The door opened again, nothing but sound to pinpoint its location. Someone wearing squeaky sneakers walked into the room, stopping next to his bed. “Mr. Bright?” A woman's voice, gentle. “My name is Brianna Morgan, I'm the head neurologist on your case. We're very glad to finally see you awake,” she announced, picking up his wrist, two fingers pushing against his pulse. “I realize that you have many questions, but I need you to try and calm down a little bit before I start answering them, okay?”

  
  


“Am I _blind_?” Malcolm blurted out the question that had been dancing around the back of his mind. He had barely heard a word she had said, his heart beating too loudly inside his ears, covering up all else. “What the hell happened to me?!”

  
  


The doctor took a breath, placing his hand back on the bed carefully, like he would break. “You have been with us for over a month now,” she explained bluntly. “You arrived with a moderate occipital contusion that resulted into some internal hemorrhaging and increased intracranial pressure. Fortunately, it resolved by itself with no need for surgical intervention, but you've been in a coma for these past weeks. And, while most of the blood has already been absorbed by your brain tissue, we had no way to assess the damage it had caused until you woke up.”

  
  


“You didn't answer my question,” he pointed out, sullenly. Her words were still bouncing around his bruised brain, making his breathing race and his hands start to shake. A month. Coma. Damage. Brain damage...

  
  


“If you lay back down and allow me to examine you, I might,” she offered kindly.

  
  


Malcolm submitted. He was too desperate for answers to argue with her anyway. Her fingers touched his face, turning it one side, then the next. Keeping his left eye open with her fingers, a soft click signaled she had turned on some kind of light. Bright flinched, expecting the intense light to hit his eyes, but it never came. She switched her fingers to his other eye. Still nothing.

  
  


“Did you see anything?” Brianna enquired. “A shape, shadows, a hint of light?”

  
  


Malcolm felt like Earth had ceased to exist. He was floating in a sea of nothingness, drowning. “No,” he whispered, defeated.

  
  


“Well, your pupils are reacting normally to light, which makes me believe that this is definitely related to your brain injury,” she explained. “We'll need to do some further testing to determine whether this is a permanent condition, but for now, I would like you to answer some questions before I leave,” the doctor went on. “Malcolm...are you listening to me?” she asked.

  
  


Bright nodded, absentmindedly. It was hard to understand why this was happening to him. He kept on closing his eyes, hoping that something would look different when he opened them again. But reality, however unreal it felt at the moment, stayed the same.

  
  


“Can you tell me your full name?”

  
  


“Malcolm Jacob Bright,” he answered mechanically. Former FBI agent and former NYPD consultant, now that he couldn't see. What was he going to do now? Suddenly, Malcolm didn't want to be alone in that room with a stranger. “Where is my family?”

  
  


“I believe your mother and an older gentleman with a goatee are outside, waiting to see you. Can you tell me their names?”

  
  


“Jessica Whitly and Gil Arroyo,” he supplied without hesitation.

  
  


“You're doing very well,” the doctor said, the ever present sound of a scribbling pen filling the silence in between her words. “Just a few more questions and I'll leave you to them, okay?”

  
  


Malcolm nodded, tears rapidly flooding his eyes. It was such a childish reaction, but he didn't want to answer any more questions. He just wanted his mother to chase away everyone bothering him and Gil to tell him everything was going to be alright. Still, he nodded.

  
  


“Can you tell me what year this is and how old you are?”

  
  


“2020. 31,” he whispered, his voice breaking ever so slightly. This was the landmark that he did not want to acknowledge. The year his life changed forever. “Are we done here? _Please_...”

  
  


The doctor paused, probably noticing the tears running down his face. Malcolm turned away, trying to hide the fact that he was crying like a little kid. It was easy to forget that others could still see him, despite the fact that he could not.

  
  


“I think we can do the rest later,” she offered warmly. “Do you want a minute for yourself, or can I tell your visitors to come in?”

  
  


Bright wiped away the treacherous wetness from his eyes, sniffing into his pillow. “Send them in, please.”

  
  


He took a deep breath, trying to calm his rioting emotions. As long as his brain refused to supply him with the memories of what had happened before he was brought to the hospital, he needed someone to explain it to him. Something told Malcolm that whatever had happened, Gil would know. And he would never be able to get the answers he needed if his mother and Gil walked in on him being all emotionally unstable and broken.

  
  


It was hard to gauge the passage of time when he had no reference to go by other than the beeping sounds coming from the heart monitor. It felt like some time had passed until Malcolm heard stilettos clicking against the floor. In a place where most people wore comfortable shoes, only one person could be responsible for the sound.

  
  


Gil's presence was harder to pick, but after a bit, Malcolm could discern the faint squeak of the leather in the Lieutenant's well-worn shoes.

  
  


“Malcolm-”

  
  


“Honey-”

  
  


Their voices sounded wet and dejected, which meant the doctor had shared the news with them on her way out. It was for the best, he supposed. If Malcolm tried to voice what was wrong with him in that moment, all of his resolve to keep a strong facade would crumble like a sandcastle.

  
  


“I'm fine,” he managed to say, even though it felt like a joke coming off his lips, his voice hoarse from fighting the noose around his throat.

  
  


Suddenly, there were warm arms around him, the touch of silk against his skin with a hint of flowery perfume as his mother hugged him tight. A wet drop fell against his cheek as her forehead touched his affectionately. “Of course you are,” she agreed, sharing the lie.

  
  


“How're you really feeling, kiddo?” Gil's voice sounded stronger, he too putting up a front for the sake of the others. His hand had wrapped itself around Malcolm's, a gesture neither of them was fully conscious of having happened.

  
  


“Confused,” Bright confessed, surrendering to the kiss his mother planted on his head before freeing him from her embrace. “What happened to me, Gil?”

  
  


“You don't remember?”

  
  


“The last memory I have before waking up here is sitting in the conference room, talking to JT about the latest victim and loo-looking at a picture on the board,” Malcolm told him, his mouth going dry as it dawn on him that he was remembering the last time he had ever seen a crime scene photo. “Then you got a call?” he asked, unsure.

  
  


The Lieutenant cleared his throat, dropping the profiler's hand and moving away. Distancing himself from the man on the hospital bed. A sign of guilt. “They had found another body, another retired cop, the third one in a week,” he explained. “We all went to the crime scene, interviewed the neighbors, went through the whole apartment with a fine comb...”

  
  


“...But?”

  
  


“But we missed some clue, because after everyone had left, you went back to check on something...you never told us what,” the older man went on, his voice growing thicker as he neared the end of his tale. It was easy enough to guess what had happened next. “We assume the killer was there, because the next thing we heard was the sound of breaking glass and a loud thud coming from the alley behind the building. We found you unconscious, on top of a waste container...”

  
  


Malcolm tensed, his breath caught inside his chest. He couldn't remember any of that, it was like listening to a fantasy story, events that had happened to someone else. After a month in the hospital, he couldn’t even relate to the fact that his body had been subjected to such trauma. All that was left were his useless eyes.

  
  


Jessica pulled herself closer to her son, sitting on the edge of the bed. She absently ran her fingers through his hair. Malcolm didn't remember his mother ever being that tender, a sure sign that he had scared the crap out of her.

  
  


“Did you ever catch the killer?”

  
  


There was a long pause. Malcolm imagined that Gil had nodded his answer because he heard a faint _'Crap!'_ before the actual answer. “Trail went cold after that,” the Lieutenant voiced. “We figured that whatever happened before you were thrown out that window scared him enough to lay low for a while.”

  
  


Bright closed his eyes. It didn't make much difference, but it helped him think. He needed to remember. Somewhere out there was a killer that was after retired policemen and Malcolm was probably the only one who had seen him beside his victims. “Am I a target?” he asked out of the blue, as the realization suddenly popped into his head. It made sense, after all. Alive, he was risk that the killer could not afford to take.

  
  


“We kept constant surveillance around the hospital and your room, but it's been a month and no attempts were made,” Gil explained. He didn't sound happy about the matter. “We'll get him, eventually.”

  
  


Details were starting to return now. Malcolm remembered the case itself fairly well. His profile on the killer had aimed at a male subject, probably in his late thirties, a narcissist who saw the police force as the enemy. They had done a thorough search on the victims’ past cases, but there were no common points other than the fact that they had all retired with the rank of Lieutenant. Apart from that, the three victims had all been of different ethnicities, who had worked in precincts miles apart in completely different departments.

  
  


In the absence of a solid link between the victims, Bright had assumed that the killer's vengeance was against the force itself, coming as far as suggesting that he was also a police officer himself. That suggestion had not sat well with the rest of the team.

  
  


“Malcolm, sweetheart,” his mother called out, fingers leaving his hair to palm his face. “I know how much you love discussing murder and otherwise gross things...but we need to talk about the—the rest.”

  
  


Malcolm stiffened. For a fleeting moment, he had felt normal, talking about a crime with Gil. Yet another thing that he wouldn't be able to do in the future. “What's to talk about?” he asked petulantly. He felt like this was something he had the right to be unreasonable about.

  
  


“I want to take you to the best neurologist in the city,” Jessica said, leaving no room for argument. “The doctors here seem all too resigned to the fact that your eyes simply stopped working...I want a second opinion and we're getting the best one there is. I can call-”

  
  


The more words came out of her mouth, the more Malcolm felt his heart shrink inside his chest, his lungs burning with the simple effort of breathing. His palms were sweaty, resting against the bed sheets. He did not want to be poked and probed just to satisfy his mother's need for denying the truth. “No.”

  
  


Although the doctor hadn't bothered to call it anything, the condition wasn't completely unfamiliar for Malcolm. Cortical blindness was a relatively common side effect of severe trauma to the back of the head and while it could be temporary in most cases, the profiler knew that after a month, his condition was most likely permanent.

  
  


“What do you mean 'no'?”

  
  


“Simple enough word, mother,” Malcolm let out, pulling away from her touch. Suddenly, it was too much, too invasive, too caring. He didn't want to feel, he just wanted it all to go away. “I'm kind of tired...” he whispered, turning his back on them, hoping that they would take the not-too-subtle hint.

  
  


Gil sighed, resting a hand against Malcolm's turned shoulder. “We'll get out of your hair, kid,” he whispered, giving the bony limb under his fingers a gentle squeeze. “Let me know if you need anything in the meantime, okay?”

  
  


There was a quiet scuffle, a soft hiss from his mother. Malcolm closed his eyes, his mind providing him with the visuals that his eyes failed to deliver, seeing Gil pulling Jessica along with him, urging her to give her son the solitude that he had cordially requested.

  
  


“Fine...” the woman finally agreed, leaning over the bed. Malcolm felt the warmth of her hand near his face, but she refrained from touching him this time. “I—I'll be back tomorrow,” she added in a rush, walking away. “Love you, sweetheart,” she whispered, sounding almost afraid of saying it.

  
  


Malcolm pulled the covers closer to his ears, hoping to block sound alongside with his lost sight. He knew he was hurting his mother, but he couldn't help it. She was grasping at a kind of hope that he could not afford to acknowledge. A fool's hope. Because, like fool's gold, it held no value.

  
  


<0>

  
  


Ainsley turned the key on the door to his apartment, kicking it open with a foot as she led Malcolm inside. “Mother will not be pleased when she finds out that you escaped from the hospital,” she pointed out, not for the first time.

  
  


Truth was, Bright was slowly going insane in that small room, sitting on that bed, with nothing more to do than listening to his thoughts all day long. On a regular day, his mind was not a pleasant place to be and the past days had been far from regular. So, he had begged -blackmailed- his sister into picking him up under threat of getting himself a taxi if she didn’t show up.

  
  


Malcolm still couldn’t remember a thing about ’ _the accident_ ’, as his mother insisted on calling the act of being pushed out a window by a violent killer.

  
  


Everyone kept telling him that he had been lucky. Landing on that garbage container had been the difference between a nasty contusion and going splat on the asphalt. Malcolm wasn’t so sure he shared their opinion.

  
  


“Do you wanna change out of those clothes?” Ainsley suggested, sounding more lost than he felt. “Maybe a bath? I can run you a mean bubble bat-”

  
  


“I’d rather be alone for now, if you don’t mind Ains,” Malcolm let out, forcing himself to sound like he was in control of his emotions, hoping that she didn’t look hard enough to see how close he was to falling apart. In the hospital, even though there were good chunks of time when there was no one else in the room with him, the profiler had never felt at ease, with enough control over his environment to allow his emotions to surface. He ached for a moment of solitude, when he didn’t have to pretend that everything was okay. That he was okay.

  
  


“Mal, I can't just leave you here all alone, not with all the...” she pointed out, her voice fading away as she thought of the many reasons why. “The doctor said that the bleeding isn't completely gone yet, so you shouldn't even be here, let alone by yourself-”

  
  


“AINS!... _please_ ,” the profiler let out, barely controlling his anger. “Just...just for a bit, okay? You can come back later,” he offered as a peace trade. “Bring some takeout...we'll do dinner and a movie, for old times sake,” he added, the idea of watching anything at all eliciting a dark bark of laughter from his lips that had nothing to do with joy. “Please...”

  
  


His sister sighed, close enough that he could feel her clean, hot breath on his skin. “Fine...a girl knows when she's not welcome,” she offered, grabbing his arms to pull him closer and plant a kiss on his cheek. “Luisa was here earlier to air out the place, change the sheets, that sort of stuff. I'll go now, but you have to promise me that you'll stay in bed until I come back,” she warned sternly. “I know this is your house, but someone needs to give you the tour of the place so you don't end up using the kitchen's sink as a toilet, okay?”

  
  


Malcolm smiled because he knew that was what his little sister would expect him to do at her lame attempt at a joke. “I promise...no confusing the bathroom with the kitchen,” he let out, holding his hand over his heart, like the proper boy scout that he never was.

  
  


Ainsley paused. He could feel her eyes on him, judging the sincerity of his words. He rolled his eyes dramatically, making her giggle. He loved making his little sister giggle, the sound always reminding him of a time when he was happy being just a kid, an older brother. Before he became the boy who turned in his father to the police.

  
  


“Okay then...arm!”

  
  


The profiler allowed Ainsley to lead him to his bed. As soon as she turned him around, Malcolm was completely lost on where he was. He wavered, dizzy with the vastness of emptiness and darkness around him.

  
  


“Step,” Ainsley warned, grabbing his arm tighter as the tip of Malcolm's shoes scuffed against the edge of the step, missing it altogether. They both fumbled for a moment, doing a barely controlled crash landing on the soft bed. The frame creaked under their combined weight.

“Mal...you sure you want me to g-”

  
  


“I'm sure,” he let out, determined, his hands working the edge of the sports coat he was wearing, pushing it away. He toed off his tennis shoes at the same time, clearly signaling that he had every intention of going to sleep.

  
  


“Fine,” Ainsley huffed, the mattress' springs easing as she got up. ”I'm coming back in four hours...behave, or I'll sic mom on your ass!”

  
  


Malcolm leaned back on the bed, giving her nothing but a thumbs up. He would still be there in four hours, and probably so would his mother, because there was no way Ainsley was going to keep her mouth shut about him being out of the hospital. She was probably already looking into German nurses again...

  
  


He waited, counting the seconds in his head, waiting for his sister to leave. Her heels clacked against the hard floor, gently growing fainter until he could hear the door opening and closing after her.

  
  


Malcolm sat up, listening. The house echoed in emptiness with nothing but the quiet, occasional chirping from Sunshine to break the oppressive silence.

  
  


Grief hit him like a giant wave, crashing against his lungs, stealing his breath away. Malcolm gulped air in like he was drowning. Drowning in the immenseness of it all, drowning in the surrounding darkness. It felt like oil, sticky against his skin, sucking him in.

  
  


The dark was not his friend. The dark was where his nightmares lived, where his mind played the hunter and he was nothing but prey, being chased around all night long until he woke up gasping in the morning. Only, there was no waking up now.

  
  


The monsters were there with him even now. Although he knew that he was alone, Malcolm could almost see the shadows moving, dusty black smoke against a black curtain, fluttering, wavering, taunting him. There were glimpses in the dark, quick flashes of the layout of his place, of his sister, of the sun coming in through the windows. They meant nothing now, just snapshots of what he wished he could see.

  
  


He got to his feet, trying to ease his erratic breathing, socks slipping against the wood. Malcolm knew how big that loft was, it was one of the reasons why he had requested it as his home. And yet, spacious as it was, he felt trapped, like he was the one inside a box now.

  
  


He moved carelessly, his mind too preoccupied with panicking to actually consider the physical world he was currently navigating. Like a sleepwalker, he walked aimlessly, completely forgetting about the step that parted his bedroom from the rest of the house. The floor suddenly disappeared from under his feet, sending Malcolm fumbling forward, arms flapping by his side as he tried in vain to regain his balance.

  
  


He ended up on the floor, knees smacking against the hardboard with a jolt of pain that he could feel in his teeth. Tears mixed with bitter laughter as he flopped on his back, stating at nothing. “See that, Sunshine? I can fly too,” he pointed out. “Although, I guess I suck at being a bird, hum...”

  
  


His home was as unfamiliar to him as the hospital room had been. Bright had bullied his sister into bringing him home in the faint hope that he would feel better once he was surrounded by his own things, by a familiar environment that wouldn't feel as scary and devoid of hope as the hospital had been.

  
  


He was wrong. It didn't matter what stood outside his mind. It was all the same now. All the same shade of black.

  
  


In the corner by the staircase leading upstairs, her high heel shoes hanging from one hand, Ainsley wiped a tear from her face, sitting quietly on the steps, watching.

  
  


<0>

  
  


It felt like hours before Malcolm found the courage to get to his feet. His butt had grown numb and, dressed in nothing more than sweat pants and a t-shirt, he was growing cold.

  
  


Wiping the tears off his face, the profiler got to his feet. For a moment he panicked, unsure exactly where he was and how the hell he was going back to bed. Besides, now that he was standing, his bladder insistingly reminded him that he had some business to attend to.

  
  


He pushed the panic down, forcing himself to use his head for a moment. There were 360 degrees of choice around him, and he needed to pick the one direction that would lead him to his bathroom as quickly as possible. With only hard floor boards under his socked feet and nothing within reach of his extended arms, Malcolm took a brave step forward.

  
  


And then another.

  
  


And another.

  
  


A soft rug materialized under his feet. He reached out, catching the edge of the leather sofa. The texture was so familiar to him that he could almost see its shiny, polished black.

  
  


Now that he knew where he was, he realized that he could smell the leather as well. He had never realized that his couch had a scent of its own.

  
  


Turning his back on the sofa, Malcolm slid sideways until he reached its curly edge, reaching out until he grasped the kitchen island, exchanging the safety of leather for the solid feeling of the marble countertop.

  
  


He took a step forward, toes smashing against the metal stool, nested underneath the counter. “Shit!” he let out, kicking the bench harder just for the pleasure of feeling it fly over and crashing against the floor.

  
  


Once that obstacle was properly beaten, it was mostly smooth sailing until he reached the bathroom.

  
  


He had dealt with the whole issue of 'aiming' without seeing while he was still in the hospital, with various degrees of success and lack thereof. In the end, and for the sake of the cleaning crew and the sheer disgusting factor of the whole problem, Malcolm had just decided to be a man about the matter and sit his ass down.

  
  


Bright felt a small degree of pride grow inside of him. He had managed to find his own bathroom and use it like a big boy. Granted, it had taken him an absurd amount of time and his toe was throbbing mercilessly, but he had done it. All by himself.

  
  


By the time Ainsley returned, claiming that she had forgotten about the food and announcing that she was taking him out to eat, Malcolm didn't feel like the darkness was quite so overwhelming anymore.

  
  


<0>

  
  



	2. Chapter 2

<0>

  
  


Malcolm leaped forward, the restraints on his arms preventing him from flying off his bed like he seemed intent to. He blinked slowly, acknowledging the now familiar feeling of complete disorientation as he was faced with eternal night. He could feel warmth against his skin, already working at drying the cold, nightmarish sweat from his body. The sun was up already.

  
  


He spat his mouth guard out before flopping back down on the bed, devoid of energy already. The alarm hadn't come on yet, and Malcolm bitterly remembered that it wasn't coming on anytime soon. He had bumped into the damn thing the day before, the whole stereo broken beyond repair as soon as it hit the floor. There wouldn't be music to force him out of bed in the foreseeable future.

  
  


Sunshine complained from her cage, an ever growing raucous that, in the end, proved to be more effective than B.B. King ever could at getting the profiler out of bed.

  
  


Flipping open the restraints on his wrists was about the one thing that hadn't changed in his routine. He had always done it half asleep, without actually looking. Muscle memory was currently his best friend, as his fingers found the latch for each and freed himself easily.

  
  


Grappling for the nightstand, Malcolm reached for his cellphone, running his fingers across the expanse of the screen. A robotic voice, vaguely female, told him it was seven thirty in the morning and that it was set to rain in the afternoon. “Good to know that, Hal 9000,” he mumbled humorlessly, running a hand through his hair. He should take a shower, but he was still recovering from the body oil in the hair incident. He really needed to find a way to label his showering bottles right.

  
  


Instead, he decided to give his yoga routine another chance. The first time he had tried the tree pose, the result had been less than stellar, ending up with him falling down on his ass in a very ungraceful manner.

Instead, he went for the simple sukhasna, sitting with his legs crossed and arms resting gently on his knees. He closed his eyes out of habit, allowing himself to better concentrate on his breathing. In. And out...slowly. With each breath, Malcolm could feel his muscles relaxing, his limbs growing weightless. His thoughts thinning out until his mind was empty.

  
  


He reached deep inside, poking the core of his soul. In there, everything was bright and colorful, memories dancing in front of his inner eye. He could feel life, pulsing around him, inside him. Blood rushing inside his veins, life flourishing at the rhythm of energy being created and consumed.

  
  


He was at peace, away from the restrictions of the world. In that void, a sound started to make itself known. A pulsing sound, like waves hitting upon a shore.

  
  


No, it was faster than the gentle pace of the ocean. If anything, it was the pulsing sound of a storm. Or a speeding heart.

  
  


Sunshine, who had been chirping quietly at him since he’d been up, called out again, more urgently this time around. She was running out of patience.

  
  


“ Alright, girl!” Malcolm told her, rising to his feet and already moving towards the kitchen. After one disastrous fall to the floor and three near misses, he had learned to move carefully away from his bed, searching for the treacherous step with the edge of his toes. Once he found it, he safely moved to the kitchen. Ten steps to reach the counter. Five steps to the side took him to the sink, underneath which rested Sunshine's food. “Breakfast is ready, my queen,” he joked, hoping that the sound of his voice would calm the bird down somewhat.

  
  


Sunshine, however, was having none of that.

  
  


Malcolm stopped in his tracks. It wasn't usual for his bird to be that noisy in the morning. Usually she would just chirp and twirl, having long conversations with either her friend in the mirror or signaling Malcolm that she wanted to stretch her wings. This was neither.

  
  


The bird sounded alarmed. Scared.

  
  


Malcolm palmed the kitchen island, searching for his knife set even before he heard the noise on the second floor. Footsteps.

  
  


Armed with the first knife he managed to plunk from the block, Malcolm slowly made his way back, intended to reach his bed. His cell phone was still on the nightstand to the left, where he had left it after waking up. But even if he could reach it before the home invader came downstairs, Malcolm knew that he wouldn’t be able to dial on touch alone, he would need to speak up, dial by voice...which would alert the burglar to his actions. He stopped, grabbing the weapon on his hand tighter. He could feel his own heart beating against his ears.

  
  


The neighborhood was fairly safe, with no reports of robberies happening in the area in the past months. Still, Malcolm knew that he was now a easy target. The blind guy, living by himself, with the house filled with expensive antiques and paintings.

  
  


There was also the possibility that the cop killer had come out of hiding to finish what he started at the crime scene. Either way, Malcolm knew that his chances of facing whomever was inside his house with a kitchen knife and no idea where to aim, were slim to none.

  
  


He stood with his back against the kitchen island, arms shaking, legs tense, ready to jump at the slightest noise.

  
  


The sound of the door buzzer fell like a cannon volley inside the quiet house, causing Malcolm to lose his grip on the knife. It plunked against the floor, blade bouncing ever so slightly.

  
  


The profiler quickly bent down to pick it up before rushing to the door, fumbling for the button that would open the door downstairs.

  
  


Inside the house, everything had grown quiet. The staircase to the second floor had one step in need of repair, the seventh from the bottom. Malcolm kept an ear out for the familiar squeaky noise as someone stepped on it. It never came.

  
  


“ Is there a reason why you're greeting me at knife point?” JT pointed out, sounding mildly concerned. He was probably looking at Bright like the man had finally lost his mind.

  
  


“ There's someone upstairs,” Malcolm whispered.

  
  


The detective went from half joking to full business in less than a second. A heavy bag dropped to the floor, metal tools clunking inside. “Stay here,” he ordered, the rustling of clothes flagging the fact that he had just drawn his weapon out.

  
  


Malcolm held on to the knife, his mind screaming at him to follow the other man upstairs. It felt utterly wrong to sit back while someone else risked their life for him. What if there was more than one burglar up there? What if JT got shot because of him?

  
  


The seventh step creaked. From there, there were eight more steps until the top. Bright took a deep breath, switched the knife to his left hand and reached out with his right, searching for the banister. It didn't mattered that he couldn't see a thing; he was not leaving Tarmel without backup.

  
  


“ There's no one up here,” JT called out, sounding like he was standing by the glass door that gave access to the roof. “I can see some footsteps here though, on the gravel.”

  
  


Malcolm abandoned the idea of climbing the treacherous staircase, going back to the kitchen island. He was placing the knife back on the stand when JT joined him.

  
  


“ Want me to call the crime lab people?” the detective offered. “I mean, I didn't see anyone, but if you're sure that there was someone upstairs, they can lift a shoe print off that gravel easily-”

  
  


The profiler ran a hand through his hair. Maybe he had just imagined the sound. Maybe he had allowed himself to be carried away by Sunshine's alarmed screeches. Either way, he knew he wasn't exactly the most reliable source when it came to reality. “The chimney cleaning crew comes every so often,” he offered dismissively. It wasn't exactly a lie, but it came pretty close. “It was probably them I heard.”

  
  


JT stood silently, watching him. Although he could not see it, Malcolm could feel the other man's eyes on him, trying to figure out what was really going on inside his head. “Yeah…. still, I'm posting a unit downstairs and setting you up with one of those alarm button thingies,” the detective announced, reaching a decision.

  
  


Malcolm frowned. “Life Alert? Do I look like a ninety year old lady to you?” the profiler let out, offended.

  
  


“ You look like someone who currently doesn't even know where his phone is, because you failed to call 911, despite thinking that there was an intruder in your house,” Tarmel countered. “And it's not an  _ old ladies _ ’ thing...it’s a valuable alarm system that works and that would make all of us feel a lot better about leaving you here by yourself.”

  
  


It was hard to argue with the detective's logic when he made sense like that. Even though he sounded suspiciously like Jessica Whitly. Still... “I know exactly where my phone is...it was just that the knives were closer.”

  
  


“ Of course they were...” the other man voiced, sounding unconvinced. He moved back to the door, picking up the bag he had dropped there. “So, I brought the stuff...you ready for me to start?”

  
  


Malcolm 'looked' at the other man, confused.

  
  


“ The  _ stuff _ to make sure that you don't kill yourself walking around your evil lair house,” the detective reminded him. “Seriously, dude...just how many lethal weapons do you have in here?” he let out with a smack of his lips. “Although...those are some sweet looking swords.”

  
  


The profiler smiled. He had no idea which ones JT was looking at, but all that he had on display had been bought because they had something special, whether it was the craftsmanship or the history behind them. Some of them were priceless. “Wanna try one?” he offered, feeling like he was eight all over again, showing his friends from school the new cool toy his dad had bought him for Christmas.

  
  


“ Sure!”

  
  


“ Well...help yourself,” the profiler urged. “The displays aren't locked.” A contemptuous detail that his mother always pestered him about, pointing out that having easily reachable weapons in the same room as a notorious sleepwalker with night terrors was an insurance nightmare.

  
  


Malcolm walked over to the couch, letting the smell of leather guide him. He heard the display's lock turning. JT let out an appreciative whistle. “Man...I'm a guns and pistols kind of guy, but I gotta tell you,” he paused, his attention taken by the vast display, “some of these swords are  _ sweet _ !”

  
  


The detective took some time returning. When he did, he was swishing a long blade in his hands.

  
  


Malcolm stopped breathing. Instinctively, he knew that JT would never hurt him, but that was not what his eyes were telling him. He could 'see' the blade cutting through the air, a blue line of light dancing in the darkness, edging closer and closer.

  
  


JT turned his back on the profiler, carefully distancing himself from him and the furniture, however, not used to holding the slick handle of the katana in his hands, the detective lost his grip as he did a swipe from the floor up. The sharp sword flew from his hands as he fumbled to regain his grip.

  
  


JT’s stretched out 'Shiiiiiit!” echoed against his ears as the detective realized what was happening. Time slowed as Malcolm watched the blue light cut through the air, moving towards him. In the last possible second, the profiler ducked down as the sword flew past his head. It cluttered against the hardboards, long blade flapping against the floor like a dying fish.

  
  


For a moment, as all motion stopped and time resumed its pacing, neither man moved or dared to breathe. Malcolm could hear JT's ragged breathing, swallowing convulsively as the detective realized what had almost happened.

  
  


“ Dude,” JT let out slowly, finally daring to speak. “Are you okay?”

  
  


Malcolm nodded. He looked back at where the sword had landed, but he couldn't see a thing. As fast as the weird vision had come, it was gone again.

  
  


“ _How_ are you okay?” the detective asked, sounding completely dumbstruck. “One second that thing was in my hand, the next it was flying straight at you...” he voiced, lost for words. “Bro, don't get me wrong, I'm the happiest man on Earth that my stupid, clumsy fingers didn't just turn you into a shish kabab, but how the hell did you do that?!”

  
  


Bright frowned. He realized that he had no idea.

  
  


<0>

  
  


Malcolm had stopped taking his medication.

  
  


It wasn’t a conscious decision. He just forgot. For about a week.

  
  


He supposed that, in the midst of how miserable he was feeling overall and the fact that he had barely left his bed, withdrawal passed him by, the nausea and cold sweats drowned by the misery of everything else.

  
  


Odd as it seemed, his lack of sight made everything else seem bigger, louder, occupying more space than it should.

  
  


Sometimes, Malcolm woke up in the middle of the night, alarmed by the sound of water sloshing by. The first couple of times he had panicked, certain that he was inside a ship, sinking into the ocean. He would look around, searching for the source of water, but there was nothing there.

  
  


Took him awhile to realize it was the water in the pipes that he was hearing.

  
  


Or the fact that he could now tell what the special of the day was at the diner across the street because he could smell it from his kitchen. On Tuesdays, they had lasagna and Fridays was roast chicken day. It was an easy way to keep track of week days.

  
  


And it wasn't just his hearing and smell that had gone off the rails to compensate for his lack of sight.

  
  


The last time Luisa had stopped by to change his bed sheets, Malcolm had woken up in the middle of the night, feeling like his skin was on fire. Whatever had been mixed with the cotton sheets had felt like sandpaper rubbing against his skin, its touch impossible to bear. He had ended up pulling the whole thing off and sleeping on the bare mattress.

  
  


His mother came by on occasion, always insisting that, if he wouldn't allow her to hire someone to help around the house, then he move back in with her now that he had such a handicap. She didn’t actually say the last part out loud, but it was implied how useless she thought him to be now that he was blind.

  
  


It was a sentiment that Malcolm shared, even if he refrained to admit it outside his own head.

  
  


Ainsley had offered to take him in too, even though he could hear the hesitation in her voice. She had made the offer because it would look wrong not to, but he could almost _see_ her fear at taking on the responsibility of looking after a blind brother. Besides, both of them treasured their independence too deeply to share a house with each other.

  
  


He didn’t want to be a burden. He just wanted his life to be as it was before. But every day that he woke up, opened his eyes and the nightmares remained lingering against the darkness in his pupils, he realized that nothing would be normal ever again.

  
  


His father kept demanding that he resumed his visits to Claremont. Malcolm figured no one had yet bothered to tell Martin Whitly that he could give up on his illusions to mold his son in his image. There really weren't that many blind killers.

  
  


Still, Malcolm could see him on occasion. Sometimes he would turn around and find his father sitting on one of the kitchen stools, playing with the knife set. Other times he was in the middle of the living room, waltzing with the girl in the box to the sound of phantom music.

  
  


Gil had been around a couple of times, doing the best he could to adapt the place to Malcolm’s new reality. It hadn’t been that hard since the profiler had never been one to have a cluttered home, always keeping it to the bare minimum. But it was the little things the Lieutenant offered to make that made a difference…having him around helped to fight off the ghosts and the darkness a little bit, his presence warm and light.

  
  


The Lieutenant had taken upon himself to reorganizing Malcolm's kitchen, foolishly believing that the profiler would ever use it for anything else but fetching candy and glass cups. He had restocked his fridge, making sure that everything was where it was supposed to be. ‘ _First shelf for dairy products; second for breakfast stuff, like eggs and bacon. Bottom shelf fruit and vegetables. Drinks on the door…_ ’

  
  


Everyone else was trying to help, one way or the other. Malcolm figured that, like him, they too were trying to adapt to his condition. Their happiness, it would seem, was dependent of his success at adapting to a life without the use of his sight.

  
  


Dani had organized his clothes in his drawers by color, giving each a different tactile label. She may have outed herself in her preference for seeing Malcolm wearing blue shirts, because she insisted those to be in the top drawer, while white and black shirts were pushed to the drawer closer to the floor.

  
  


JT had nailed safety pins on the floor, signaling stuff like the raised step into his bed or the edge of the staircase upstairs. He could have fixed the step on the stairs as well, but Malcolm insisted he didn't.

  
  


Ainsley had signed him up for some Braille classes that Malcolm had no intention of attending.

  
  


The hospital had given him a cane. Malcolm forgot where he had placed it when he first arrived, so good luck in finding it now. It wasn't like he was going outside anyway. The mere thought of walking in a busy street, bumping into lampposts and people, assaulted by a million smells and sounds that he could neither trace nor avoid...it was too much to handle.

  
  


He walked from his bed to the kitchen island, the feeling of hardboard wood solid against the palms of his feet.

  
  


There were some leftovers in the fridge, from the last time Edrisa had come by, too long ago from the smell that assaulted his nose.

  
  


The doorbell rang and Malcolm cursed. He wasn’t really in the mood for company, but it wasn’t like he could pretend not to be home. After all, where would he go?

  
  


Reaching out with his left hand to locate the kitchen island, Malcolm followed the cold marble until the edge. From there, it was ten steps to the door. “Who—“

  
  


Bright stopped, blinking against the sudden burst of color that exploded against his eyes. Red, orange, and bright white. A woman’s shape. Curly hair. _Dani_.

  
  


“ Bright, open up!” Dani called out from the other side of the door, knocking against the glass. Someone had clearly opened the door downstairs for her, because she was right at his door. “Come on, man! I’m freezing my butt off out here!”

  
  


Malcolm opened the door on autopilot, his hands unconsciously reaching out to rub at his eyes. The darkness was back, and all that lingered from the glimpse he had seen was a nasty headache.

  
  


“ You okay?” the detective asked, quietly stepping into the house and noticing his stance. Her heeled boots clacked against the hardboard, making it easy to follow her around. When her hand reached out to touch his shoulder, Malcolm was ready. He didn’t flinch. This time.

  
  


“ Yeah… fine,” he let out, taking a deep breath. “Just a headache.”

  
  


Now that he thought about it, Malcolm would admit that those ‘episodes’ had been happening more often since he stopped his medication. At first, he had just assumed it was withdrawal, hallucinations, violent reminders from his psyche to make him resume his usual drugs.

  
  


He had ‘seen’ Sunshine the other day, his hand automatically reaching out for her as she flew in his direction. It was only when he felt her little claws against his skin that Malcolm realized what he had done. For the bird, nothing had changed, to her he was still the same person.

  
  


“ Come on,  I'll make you some coffee while you dress up,” Dani announced excitedly, leading him by the elbow to his bedroom. People had taken to doing that lately, just grabbing his arm and leading him here and there, like he was a dog on a leash. It annoyed the hell out of him.

  
  


Malcolm pulled away gently, searching for the edge of the unmade bed with his knees before sitting down. “Why?”

  
  


“ Because I’m taking you to the precinct, that’s why!” she announced. He could almost hear her grin.

  
  


“ Why?” he asked again, flopping bonelessly against the rumpled sheets. It was a valid question, not just childish petulance on his part.

  
  


He was blind. He couldn’t look at crime scene photos, he couldn't see the micro expressions on the suspects’ faces, he couldn’t read any lab or forensic reports. He was useless at the precinct. His future as a profiler was over.

  
  


“ Because we need your help with a case, so Gil sent me to get you,” Powell explained, like it was that simple.

  
  


Malcolm sat back up, sending a bitter look in the direction he guessed the woman was. “And how, pray tell, am I going to do that? Should I press my hands to the suspect’s face and wait for him to twitch when he answers a question? Or do you want me to feel up the corpse to get an idea of how the killer acted?”

  
  


“ Don’t be a dick,” Dani let out softly, sitting by his side. “I know that right now the only thing you can recognize is this one thing you lost,” she went on, a hand resting on his bouncing knee. It quietened under her touch. “But if you give this a chance, you’ll soon understand everything else that you still have to offer. Your life is not over, Bright; it’s just changed.”

  
  


“ Next you’re gonna tell me how blind people can be independent and valid members of society,” he huffed, half serious, half joking.

  
  


“ If you need me to tell you that, you’re a bigger dick than I’d assumed,” she replied without missing a beat, her tone light and playful. “Now, do you want me to pick a suit for you or shall we trust chance?”

  
  


<0>

  
  


Malcolm didn't remember the outside world being quite so loud. Living in the city meant constant noise, but he guessed he had grown sort of immune to it, having lived there all his life. After all, what was New York without the sound of traffic passing by, impatient car honks, people yelling at each other, constant construction work, music blasting from at least five different places and a couple of screaming kids?

  
  


Right now, however, all the noises that had become familiar and expected were too loud, too jumbled, too much information to even begin processing.

  
  


Bright covered his ears with his hands as soon as he left Dani's car.

  
  


“ You alright? Is the head still bothering you?” she asked, concerned. Even her voice, something that he had grown to find comforting, was grating against his ears right now. “Come on, let's get you inside.”

  
  


Malcolm concentrated on his breathing, trying to block all other sounds that were driving him insane. As soon as the precinct doors closed behind them, he breathed in relief. “Thanks,” he whispered, placing his hand over hers on his elbow.

  
  


Now that he was away from the sensory overload of outside, the profiler found himself facing another source of anxiety. This was the first time he was setting foot inside the precinct after his 'injury' and he wasn't quite sure what to expect.

  
  


He knew he looked the same. The blindness was a result of his brain wires being crossed wrong, so there was nothing different about his eyes. Decorative pieces sitting on his face, but ultimately useless.

  
  


“ Can you sit here for a minute?” Dani asked, leading him towards a desk. He couldn't tell to whom it belonged. “I promised Edrisa that I would let her know when you arrived, and I'm pretty sure she will murder me if I fail to that. You be okay in here for a minute?”

  
  


Malcolm nodded, parking his ass on the chair. As her boots walked away, he leaned back. Around him, he could hear bits and pieces of conversations, policemen discussing their current cases, sipping coffee, talking about what they were going to do over the weekend.

  
  


His hands found the edge of the desk, boredom turning into curiosity as he set out to find who it belonged to. It wasn’t his, that had been easy to figure out, since the seat was set higher than his usually was. Someone with longer legs then.

  
  


The keyboard and computer were the same for everyone, so no help there. There was also the fact that the desk was clean and organized, his fingers not brushing against a single stray paper or abandoned pencil. That pretty much excluded Dani’s desk.

  
  


Knowing that she wouldn’t park him in just some stranger’s desk, Malcolm decided that he had to be at JT’s. And if it was true…

  
  


He leaned forward, searching for the one item the detective always had on his desk, right next to the computer, where he could see it. His fingers brushed against hard plastic and Malcolm smiled, picking up the round object. He could hear water sloshing inside the snow globe.

  
  


It was one of those cheesy things, a souvenir that tourists usually bought to prove that they had been to New York. That one in particular, and if the profiler was remembering it right, had a bad rendition of the Empire State building complete with a menacing King Kong on top.

  
  


Malcolm had pestered JT long enough that the man had eventually confessed that the snow globe had been a gift from Tally, on their first date. He liked to have it on his desk to remind himself how lucky he truly was, no matter how bad the job got.

  
  


Amidst the background noise of multiple voices that Malcolm had been filtering out, one stood out all of a sudden. “Sorry-- do you know-- where I can find-- Lieutenant Arroyo?”

  
  


Malcolm couldn't quite pinpoint why that particular voice called to his attention. Maybe it was the hesitation in between words, the inherent nervousness or even Gil's name... but mostly, it was the feeling of fabrication. Whomever had spoken was neither hesitant nor nervous. There was a steel resolve hidden underneath the seemingly innocent question, a man with a purpose.

  
  


Then why the deceit?

  
  


Out of habit, Bright looked in the direction of the voice, fully knowing that he wouldn't be able to see a thing.

  
  


Light assaulted his eyes once more. Fiery red, blinding white and burning yellow, all mixed in random, erratic waves and patterns that seemed determined to make him feel nauseous and sick.

  
  


Not...not random.

  
  


Swallowing past the bile in his mouth, Malcolm could see that the waves were organized, creating images of their own.

  
  


A desk.

  
  


A man in a uniform by the water cooler.

  
  


Two women talking by the interrogation room.

  
  


A man wearing a baseball cap and a long overcoat, talking to a detective by the door. The detective raised his arm, the limb tracing lines of heat across the air, before standing still, pointing towards Gil's office.

  
  


The man in the baseball cap smiled, a cold pull of lips to reveal his bared teeth. A victory snarl.

  
  


Malcolm's heart raced inside his chest. He had no idea what was going on with his eyes, but he was pretty sure the intentions of the man in the baseball cap were not the best.

  
  


The man took a step towards the Lieutenant's office, pulling his long jacket open along the way. Cold blue glinted in the dark as the man grabbed for something long and solid, the smell of gun oil intensifying in the air.

  
  


It all moved so fast that Malcolm didn’t have time to stop and process what the heck he was doing and what was happening to him. One second, the man was pulling an automatic weapon from underneath his coat, the next, Malcolm was grabbing the snow globe from JT’s desk and hurling it towards the man’s head.

  
  


Bright was on the move even before the globe hit its mark. As he reached the man, the shooter was already falling, his head bleeding. The profiler took advantage of his pain, easily pulling the weapon from his hands and popping the cartridge out, all in the same swift motion.

  
  


It was over in less than three seconds.

  
  


“ Malcolm?”

  
  


Gil’s voice came from right behind him, at the door of his office. Malcolm turned around too fast, losing his balance and reaching for the wall for support. Only then did it sink in that he could see the wall.

  
  


Well, not exactly  _ see  _ in the usual sense of the word. If he remembered right, that particular wall wasn’t pale yellow, nor did it usually waver like it was made of water instead of plaster. He lost his battle with nausea, retching bile and spit on to the floor.

  
  


A hand wrapped itself around his arm, pulling him inside. He followed willingly, wiping his mouth clean and surrendering the weapon in his other hand to a nearby officer. On the floor, the would-be shooter was already in cuffs and being yanked to his feet. JT’s snow globe was the only casualty of the whole event, lying broken and leaking water on the ground.

  
  


“ Sit,” Gil commanded. “Breathe.”

  
  


Malcolm’s lungs agreed with the suggestion wholeheartedly, pulling as much air as they could manage in one go. The profiler sank into the old couch, feeling as worn-out fabric underneath his butt. He felt like he was vibrating, his very own atoms rubbing against each other, creating heat and static.

  
  


“ What the hell happened out there?” the Lieutenant asked, placing a glass of water in his shaking hands.

  
  


Malcolm looked up. Like everything else around him, Gil was a familiar shape of red and orange, with the brightest point centered in the middle of his chest, pulsing.

  
  


The young man blinked, his mouth open in dismay. His heart. He realized that he was looking at Gil’s heart, pulsing inside his chest, beating strongly, going faster and faster the longer Malcolm remained silent. “I think I need to go back to the hospital,” he whispered, putting the glass down and pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes. He missed Gil's curious look as the water glass was set on the table without hesitation or missing the top.

  
  


This wasn’t real. This was either because he had stopped taking his medication or because his brain was bleeding harder and slowly turning into mush inside his head. Either way, he couldn’t explain it without sounding insane.

  
  


And it wasn’t just his eyes, it was everything else as well. It was the way he could hear people breathing even though they weren’t close to him, or how he could hear Gil’s heart pounding as well as he could see it. He could feel everyone else inside the precinct, a constant and continuous buzzing, like he was standing inside a beehive.

  
  


Gil sat on the side table, bringing himself to Malcolm’s eye level. He pushed the profiler hands away, looking directly at him. “Kid, tell me the truth...can you see me?” he whispered, almost afraid of asking the question, afraid to kindle some kind of hope that, if misplaced, neither of them would be able to endure.

  
  


Malcolm shook his head, unable to say the words. Whatever this was, it wasn’t his eyes working as they should. If he actually tried to explain what he was ' _seeing_ ', Gil would just assume he was lying, making fun of him. “I can't...I'm sorry.”

  
  


“ Kid-“ Gil insisted, grabbing Malcolm’s shoulders. “You knocked a guy out from across the bullpen without aiming…I don’t know any other blind person who can do that.”

  
  


Malcolm bit his lip. He could feel the sense of betrayal growing within the older man. Gil knew him well enough to know when he was lying about something, even when Malcolm wasn't technically lying. “Lucky shot,” he offered, because he couldn’t explain it better. He couldn't see...but at the same time, he kind of could.

  
  


“Okay then,” he let out, resigned. “ I'll take you to the hospital in a bit,” Gil offered, getting to his feet. “Just give me a few minutes to sort out this mess.”

  
  


Malcolm nodded, leaning back against the couch, trying to get some order to his jumbled thoughts. He sat back up, remembering why he was there in the first place. “Wait...Dani said you called me here because you needed my help with a case?”

  
  


Gil sighed, pacing back to his desk. Malcolm could hear him pick up a file, the papers rustling against each other in a large stack. “I did...I _do_ ,” he amended. “But right now, what I want is you listening in on this guy’s interrogation. I want to know why he came into _my_ station with an automatic rifle. Can you do that?”

  
  


Bright didn’t move from the couch, a frown on his face. “I’m not sure what you want me to do,” he confessed. He had dedicated his life to read people’s body language, find their little tales, uncover the truth even when people tried their best to lie. But to do that, he needed to see them. He couldn’t do that now.

  
  


He had no idea what that thing was that allowed him to detect the threat out in the bullpen and act fast enough to avoid a shootout, but the profiler knew that it wasn’t his sight coming back. Despite all the rest, he still couldn’t see Gil’s face. “I’m useless in this,” he whispered, all of his carefully placed shields coming down for a moment as he admitted the truth.

  
  


Malcolm startled as Gil grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him up to his feet. He hadn’t been expecting the older man to move that fast or come so close. He flinched, thinking that he might have upset the Lieutenant somehow. Instead of a rebuke, however, Malcolm felt himself being pulled into a tight hug.

  
  


“ You’re one of the smartest people that I know, Malcolm Bright,” Arroyo confessed, his voice low and filled with emotion. “And you will never be useless, no matter how hard you try, kid.”

  
  


The words vibrated inside the Lieutenant’s lungs. Malcolm could feel them through their connected chests. It felt like a cat, purring in his hold. It was oddly smoothing.

  
  


“ Bright!”

  
  


The single word exploded inside the room, quickly followed by an overexcited Edrisa. She carried with her the ever present scent of formaldehyde and latex gloves.

  
  


Dani, closely behind, cleared her throat, her boots shifting in the same place. “Sorry to interrupt, boss,” she uttered sheepishly, clearly embarrassed by the fact that the medical examiner had just invaded Gil’s office without so much as knocking. “We heard what happened...are you guys okay?”

  
  


“Yeah, sorry about that, sir,” the petite woman let out, barely pausing to breathe as she neared the profiler. “It’s so _good_ to finally see you here!”

  
  


Gil’s long arms were replaced by hers as she nested herself against his chest. Her hair smelled of aloe and mint, clean and fresh. “Nice to _see_ you too Edrisa,” Malcolm replied, stressing the word with a humorless chuckle. The fact was, he could see something that was definitely Edrisa, a warm shape of red and orange with rapid firing pulsing lights cursing all through her. It was a spectacle to watch.

  
  


She pulled away, still holding on to his arms. He could feel her small fingers, wrapped around his biceps, patting the hard muscle like it was a pet. He wasn’t entirely sure she was aware of what she was doing.

  
  


“ Edrisa…” Gil called out, reminding her that there were other people inside the room.

  
  


She stepped away, a nervous giggle on her lips. “Sorry...so, are you back to work? Because I have been thinking about all the changes we need to do to make things easier for you. Like, for example, I can give you my autopsy audio recordings, rather than a written report and I can have forensics do the same. Did you know that some blind people can find objects through echolocation? Or that you can have a guide-horse instead of a dog? Have you tr-”

  
  


“ Edrisa!” Gil warned her again. “ _ Breathe _ , for our sake, please!”

  
  


Malcolm smiled sadly. There seemed to be no question in Edrisa’ mind that he was coming back to work, something that he hadn’t even considered before. Empirically, he knew that visually impaired people could do pretty much anything that they set themselves to do...it was his ability to do the same that he doubted.

  
  


“ They just finished processing the perp,” Dani informed. “JT is taking him to the interrogation room right now.”

  
  


“ Good...let’s go get some answers!” the Lieutenant voiced, leading Malcolm and the others out. He kept a hold on the profiler’s hand, placing it on his elbow. “I’m taking you to the room behind the mirror. You can listen in from there.”

  
  


When they arrived, JT was already all over the would-be-shooter. If there was one thing that the detective hated above all else was someone coming into his house aiming for bloodshed. The perp was either insane or suicidal to try to pull something like that in a room filled with cops. In fact, he had been lucky Malcolm had taken him down before he could even pull out his weapon. One shot from the perp and they would have been having that interrogation at the morgue.

  
  


“That was some crazy stunt you pulled, man,” JT spoke gently, like he actually pitied the prisoner. “I mean, it takes a special kind of sucker to try to shoot his way _into_ a police station. Is that what I should call you? Sucker?”

  
  


“ Call me whatever you want, asshole!” the man hissed back, pulling at the length of chain holding his cuffs to the steel table. “I know my rights! You can't hold me here for long, and I don’t have to say shit until my lawyer gets here.”

  
  


Standing behind the two way mirror, Malcolm leaned into Gil. “He brought an automatic weapon into a public building...that can be persecuted as terrorism,” he whispered.

  
  


Inside the room, JT must have been reading their thoughts. He laughed, making a show of picking up a file from the table and reading it. “I don’t have to do shit for you, Richard,” he threw out casually. “Your prints just came back. They say that your name is Richard Steel and that you have several charges for breaking and entering and -this one’s my favorite- hate crimes! Dick -you don’t mind me calling you Dick, do you?” JT asked, not really caring about an answer. “Dick, do you have any idea what this means for you?”

  
  


Malcolm leaned closer, his forehead touching the mirror. It felt like he was inside the room, with JT and the perp. He could hear the way the perp’s breath hitched as JT called him by name, he could see the man’s hands glistening as he started to sweat. Despite the cool appearance, the man's heart was beating wildly inside his chest.

  
  


“ I’m done talking to you, asshole,” Dick blared, leaning back against the metal chair. His hand nervously started thumping against the arm rest, the clinking of metal on metal marking a steady, fast cadence. “I want my lawyer.”

  
  


“That’s the beauty of it, Dick,” JT informed him. “Because of your background and the fact that you were dumb enough to enter a _police station_ with an automatic rifle with intent to shoot us, that counts as terrorism, so I don’t have to give you _shit_!”

  
  


“ You’re joking!” Dick let out in disbelief. While he looked as cocky as before, there was now a note of uncertainty in his voice. “I’m not a goddamn terrorist! I’m white, I have my rights!”

  
  


JT moved closer, towering over the sitting man. If he was furious at the man’s display of sheer ignorance and prejudice, he did not show it. “I’m gonna step outside for a couple of hours,” he muttered quietly, almost lovingly. It was a scary tone for the usual soft spoken detective. “I'm gonna get myself a cold drink and a burger. Maybe some fries. After that, I’m gonna step outside and get some fresh air, maybe have a smoke or two,” he went on, listing all the things that would keep him busy in the near future as he walked towards the door. He didn’t smoke, but Dick smelled like he did, and that was all what mattered. “And while I do all of that, you’re gonna sit your racist, inbred, backward ass on that chair and think about having some proper answers for me when I decide to return. You hear me,  _ Dick _ ?”

  
  


Dick spat on the floor, missing JT’s shoes by a mile. “This is a goddamn joke! I was attacked! My head is bleeding! You can’t just leave me here without having someone take a look at my head!”

  
  


The detective let out a chuckle at the man’s poor choice of words before opening the door and stepping outside. Dick was probably clueless on how adequate his request had been.

  
  


“ Fucking idiot!” JT hissed as soon as he joined them in the other room.

  
  


No one could really contest that. “ Does he have a ring on his hand?” Malcolm asked quietly, even though he knew there was no way they could be heard outside the interrogation room. He could see something blue flashing in time with the sound of metal on metal. The fact that Dick was using the noise to calm himself meant that this was a ring that had been with him for quite some time, a piece of jewelry that meant more to him than simple decoration.

  
  


“ Yeah, big assed ugly thing on his right hand,” JT confirmed. “Why?”

  
  


Bright paused. “This guy wasn’t acting alone. He doesn’t sound suicidal, so there was a plan to get him out of here after the shooting,” the profiler explained. If the idea was to die at the hands of the police or even take his own life after he had shot Gil, then Dick wouldn't have a lawyer on call. He had come prepared. “What does the ring look like?” he asked.

  
  


“ White metal, big blue stone on top,” the detective described. “You think the ring is more than just a random adornment?”

  
  


Malcolm nodded. “Fraternity ring, or some group he belongs to,” he voiced. “We need to have a closer look at it.”

  
  


“ The guy doesn’t have the brain power to put something like this together,” JT voiced. “He was definitely tricked by someone, with little knowledge of how serious the consequences would be for him.”

  
  


Malcolm nodded. “Someone who wants Gil dead,” he pointed out. It seemed too much of a coincidence that they had an open case for a retired cops’ killer and at the same time another man came into the precinct with the same idea in mind.

  
  


“ How can you be so sure that he came here looking for Gil?” JT asked, sounding taken aback by the suggestion. “For all we know, he just wanted to make an appearance on the nine o’clock new after gunning down an entire precinct,” he pointed out grimly.

  
  


Gil, by his side, turned to look at the profiler. “JT’s right...how do you know that he was after me in particular? He stopped at my door, but the thing does say ‘C.O. of the Detective’s Squad’’ in it,” the Lieutenant commented. “Maybe he just wanted to shoot his way down from the top?”

  
  


Malcolm shook his head, realizing that he had never gotten around to telling them what had happened before the guy pulled out his weapon. “He asked for you by name, Gil.”

  
  


“ How?” Dani asked, having joined them at some point. “I left you by JT’s desk...the guy walked past the reception straight to Gil’s office. It’s too far, you couldn’t have heard a thing.”

  
  


Malcolm shrugged, not sure how to explain. “I just did...you can ask the officer who he talked to, he will tell you the same; he came in here looking for Gil.”

  
  


“ Well, he’s not going to get me,” Gil declared. “JT, have someone confiscate his ring as evidence and follow that lead; Dani, I need you to find out where the hell did he get a military grade weapon like that,” he ordered. “I’m gonna take Bright to the hospital and join you later, okay?”

  
  


“ Sure thing, boss,” the two detectives let out.

  
  


Malcolm felt Gil’s arm touch his hand and he grabbed it. The action was becoming familiar and almost expected, shattering the illusion of normalcy that he had been living for the past minutes. Working a case, uncovering the perp’s secrets, getting closer to finding the truth. He had almost forgotten that he couldn't see until he felt Gil offering him his arm. Which reminded him of something else. “Hey, JT...before you go,” he mumbled out, hoping that the other man would be too far away to listen. He wasn't looking forward to explain the next bit.

  
  


“ Yeah, what up?” the detective asked, his head popping back up inside the room.

  
  


“ I just wanted to say that I’m sorry about the snow globe,” Bright apologized. “I’ll make it up to you and Tally, I promise.”

  
  


There was silence for a moment from the other side. “You broke my snow globe?” the detective let out, his voice low and contained. “ _Tally’s_ globe?”

  
  


“ Technically, Dick’s head broke it,” Malcolm pointed out. “But, yeah, I’m sorry about that...I know how much it meant for you.”

“ Bro…” the detective let out, making it sound like a sigh. “I’m just glad no one got hurt,” he pointed out, sheer relief clear in his words. “But I'm dying to know how you managed to hit him like that, because, dude! That was badass!”

  
  


“ Yeah…” Malcolm mumbled. He could feel Gil’s eyes on him, accessing him, taking notes. “Badass…”

<0>

  
  



	3. Chapter 3

<0>

  
  


Malcolm sat in the doctor's office. Despite his best efforts, his leg wouldn't stop twitching. His mind was racing with thoughts, disjointed images of what had happened at the precinct racing against theories about the cop killer. Somehow, it felt like the two events were connected.

  
  


He didn't want to think about how he had stopped the shooter. Any second now, the doctor would return with the results of the exams he had been doing and tell him that it had all been his imagination, a complex mixture of deep seethed anxiety and visual hallucinations. Malcolm knew he shouldn't have stopped taking his medication.

  
  


In one form or another, he had taken those pills every day of his life since his father had been arrested. They made him feel centered and calm, and they helped with the hallucinations.

  
  


Now that he was off of them for the first time in over twenty years, Malcolm was paying the price.

  
  


“Please stop,” Gil gently asked.

  
  


Bright self consciously placed a hand over his knee, trying to stop the annoying bouncing movement. “Sorry...”

  
  


“I don't mean that, kid,” the Lieutenant let out. “I mean the stormy thoughts inside your head,” he added lightly, a smile in his tone. “I can hear them from all the way over here.”

  
  


' _Fair enough'_ , Malcolm thought, keeping his eyes away from the Lieutenant's body. ' _B_ _ecause I can hear your heart_ '. And that, above all else, was what was currently freaking him out the most. He could still hear it, the soft bumpbumpbump of Gil's heart, pumping inside his chest.

  
  


Every other time that he had hallucinated something or someone, it had stopped after a bit, as reality slowly regained control of his brain. This time around, that wasn't happening. Reality was losing its boundaries, bleeding into his overactive psyche. Or maybe it was the other way around...he could no longer tell.

  
  


“Malcolm,” a man's voice announced, walking inside the office and sitting behind his desk. “Sorry to have kept you waiting, but I wanted to be sure about the results before discussing this with you.”

  
  


“That's fine, Dr. Vincent,” Malcolm dismissed it. It wasn't like he was all too eager to be told that he was losing his mind.

  
  


“Well, as far as your tests go, I'm sorry to inform you that your visual cortex remains damaged, which led us to conclude that your current visual impairment is a permanent condition.”

  
  


“But how much does he not see?” Gil asked. It was clear what had happened at the station had left him shaken. “I mean, it's one thing to be technically blind, and another to actually not see a thing, right?”

  
  


The doctor paused, flipping through some pages. Stalling. “Has Malcolm explained to you what his condition entails?”

  
  


Gil sat back in his chair, straightened his jacket. Composing himself. “He has.”

  
  


“Cortical blindness does not depend on what the eye can or cannot see. The problem lies within the brain, as the neural pathways that would deliver the message, are simply gone,” the doctor explained anyway, pressing home the finality of the situation.

  
  


Malcolm shifted in his seat. He had gone through this before. His mother had stood by his side that time. Around. It hadn't made it any easier than now.

  
  


“From what you described to me, I believe you experienced something called blindsight,” the doctor went on. “It is the spectral opposite of visual agnosia, in which a person is able to see, but fails to recognize objects and persons. For someone with blindsight, despite the fact that they cannot see, they can still identify environments, objects, even people they know,” Vincent explained, sounding somewhat excited at the idea. “Some experts believe that 'seeing' is a much more complex function than opening our eyes and looking. It's a whole gathering of information that happens around our sight, involving all our other senses and conscious thought, which can, in part, explain this phenomenon.”

  
  


“Blindsight?” Malcolm let out, tasting the word around his mouth. It sounded alien, too mystic to be called science. “Like a psychic?”

  
  


The doctor laughed. “Not at all. Tell me...do you require your eyes to know where your mouth is? Or where the floor is in relation to your feet?” the man inquired, giving him some time like he was actually waiting for an answer. “Our senses and the way our brain comprehends the outside world is much more complicated affair than assuming that we see with our eyes and listen with our ears. Experiences such as the one you described to me are commonly observed in patients with your type of brain injury.”

  
  


“You have many people come here because they stopped an armed shooter?” Malcolm couldn't refrain himself from being sarcastic. The doctor's answer was so unsatisfying that he felt like storming out of the office.

  
  


“Well, perhaps nothing quite so dramatic...but yes, they have been known to perform some tasks that others thought impossible to achieve by a blind person.”

  
  


It really wasn’t the answer that Malcolm was hoping for. It was one thing to figure out where some piece of furniture stood. But he could see Gil’s heart beating! He saw that sword flying through the air!

  
  


Whatever this was, it wasn’t something that a neurologist could put a name to. Malcolm wasn’t sure that anyone could.

  
  


As they stepped outside, he could sense Ainsley’s perfume, some high end brand that smelled of jasmine and mango. She moved to meet them, a flourish of yellow and blue. Malcolm blinked, resisting the urge to rub his eyes. He could swear he saw her smile.

  
  


“Your ride is here, brother,” she announced. “What did the doctor say?”

  
  


“I’ll tell you on the way,” Bright let out lethargically. He felt like someone had taken a straw to his brain and sucked it dry. “Keep me updated?” he asked Gil, saying his goodbyes.

  
  


“Sure, kid,” the Lieutenant assured him. “Get some rest.”

  
  


“Come on,” Ainsley pulled at his arm, leading him in the opposite direction. “You’re going to tell me everything and then we’re going to have a serious talk.”

  
  


<0>

  
  


They stopped at the park. It was easy to tell where they were because the trees managed to cut the city cacophony nearly in half. They created a murmur of their own, with the singing birds and the gentle rustling of Spring leaves as they danced in the breeze.

  
  


“What did you want to talk about?” For a moment, Malcolm thought that Ainsley was going to ask him again about moving in with her, or perhaps ask why he wasn’t taking the Braille course she had enrolled him in.

  
  


“Remember that trip mom and me took to the Hamptons? When dad wanted to take you on one of his camping trips?” she said instead, surprising him.

  
  


_Remember_? How could he ever forget about it when it featured so heavily in his daily nightmares? How could he forget when it still gave him panic attacks to think about the bits he couldn’t actually remember?

  
  


He nodded, unable to find the words to describe how much he hated the memory of that trip.

  
  


“Something happened to me in the Hamptons,” Ainsley went on, kicking up gravel with her shoe. “Something that we never told dad or you…”

  
  


Malcolm stopped walking, grabbing his sister's hand where it rested against his elbow. She didn’t sound sad or even particularly pained about talking about it, but rather anxious and even a bit excited. Whatever had happened wasn’t necessarily bad, but the profiler was taking no chances. “Ainsley, whatever hap-“

  
  


He felt her letting go of his arm, leaving him feeling alone and abandoned in the middle of the park. His heart started to race, wondering what the hell she was doing. “Ains…”

  
  


“Think fast!”

  
  


There was no time to think at all. Like it had happened with JT’s sword incident, Malcolm saw something hurling through the air, heading straight to his face. He ducked out of the way.

  
  


Another object flew at him. And then another. And another. And one more.

  
  


Each time, Malcolm moved without thinking, pushing himself out of the way of the flying projectiles, dodging left and right. It only took him a second to realize that they were all coming from the same source.

  
  


Ainsley.

  
  


“Will you stop throwing rocks at me?” He yelled out in anger, grabbing one of the missiles as it flew past his head. Only when he felt the solid touch of the rock against his fingers did Malcolm realize what he was doing.

  
  


“God, you’re slow!” Ainsley complained dramatically, rolling her eyes.

  
  


He could _see_ her rolling her eyes. He couldn’t see her blond hair or the hazel color of her eyes, but he could see her rolling them.

  
  


“Has the chip finally fallen?” Ainsley asked. “Or should I just keep throwing rocks at you until it does?”

  
  


The chip did fall then, because Malcolm suddenly realized that Ainsley hadn’t bent down to pick up her rocky ammunition a single time. They simply floated in the air in front of her before flying towards his face.

  
  


“How are you doing that!?” The profiler asked in the most complete disbelief. Was he hallucinating that as well? Was Ainsley even there?

  
  


“Don’t be an idiot,” she let out with a chuckle. “Of course I’m here...not even you could hallucinate something this preposterous!”

  
  


Malcolm took a step back. His mind was racing with unanswered questions, so many of them that he was struggling to voice even one. Not only was he figuring out that he had some kind of ability that allowed him to see without using his eyes, but also that Ainsley, his baby sister, had the ability to move things with her mind and- “Shit! You can hear my thoughts too!?”

  
  


“Only when you yell them out like that, brother,” she informed him with a wink. “I know that you have too many questions, but for now you just need to understand that our family isn’t exactly normal-“

  
  


That brought a bout of desperate laughter out of the profiler’s mouth. That wasn’t the understatement of the year but rather of the century!

  
  


“Yeah, I agree on that… but whatever that doctor told you, he’s wrong,” she agreed. There was such conviction in her words that Malcolm didn’t even think of doubting her. “What you're experiencing isn't a consequence of your head trauma...this is something you have always had, something that you've been repressing since you were a kid. This is who you really are!” she pressed on. “Losing your sight only served to push away all the distractions and allow yourself to be the real you!”

  
  


“And you found out about this when you were five?” he asked in disbelief. It was hard to imagine little Ainsley, like some character straight out of a horror movie, making all of her dolls dance around the room before sitting down for tea. That would have freaked out a nanny or two. “And no one ever found out...wait! Mom knows?!”

  
  


Ainsley pursed her lips. “Mom wasn't all that surprised when she caught me building sandcastles without touching the sand,” she whispered conspiringly.

  
  


The profiler searched the park for a bench. He needed to sit down or he was pretty sure that he was going to fall down. How many secrets did their family have that he wasn't aware of?

  
  


“You feeling okay, Mal? You’re looking a bit grey...Am I going too fast?” she asked, truly concerned. “Shit! I always forget that I had my whole life to learn how to deal with this, but you had no clue...I wanted to tell you so many times,” she rambled on, following her brother towards a green wooden bench by the water. “Mom wouldn't let me! She was afraid that you would have the same ability as me and with the night terrors and everything else, she was afraid of what you might do unknowingly...”

  
  


Bright sat down, gripping the bench to ground himself. Under his fingers, the wood felt solid and real, unlike everything else. “So, mother has an ability as well?” he asked. It was the only reason why she wouldn't be surprised by Ainsley's display at age five.

  
  


Ainsley nodded, taking a seat beside him. “From what she told me, all the Milton's do...with the occasional flub every other generation, that is,” she pointed out.

  
  


“What--” God, how does one ask ' _what power does mother have?_ ' with a straight face and without sounding psychotic? Maybe that was it...maybe all the Miltons were just crazy. He wasn't broken, just screwed over by genetics.

  
  


“She can move objects too...and feel people's emotions when she touches them,” Ainsley supplied without a need for a question, either because the question was too obvious or because she had heard his thoughts again. “And because her ability and mine were so similar, she assumed yours would be too.”

  
  


Malcolm stopped for a minute, letting go of all the preconceived ideas he had about the world and how things work. Assuming for a moment that there was such a thing as people with abilities, what would it be like to feel everyone's emotions around you? To experience their grief, their guilt, their pain...Bright could barely cope dealing with his own, he could not imagine what it would have been like for his mother to carry such a weight her whole life. It was no small wonder that she had turned to drink to numb the feeling. The idea sparked a connection in Malcolm's mind. “My medication,” he whispered. “Did she...?”

  
  


If his mother had been concerned about what he might do in his sleep, assuming that he was like her and Ainsley...had she kept him drugged his whole life to keep everyone else safe?

  
  


“No... don't go thinking that,” Ainsley supplied out of the blue.

  
  


“Please stop doing that.”

  
  


She smiled sheepishly. “Sorry..but some of your medication really was for your condition, for the night terrors and all the rest.”

  
  


“ _Some_ ,” Malcolm pointed out, not missing the hesitation in her voice. “Which means that some others were meant to keep me sedated and disconnected from myself.” How much had Jessica Whitly paid his doctors to fool him his whole life? How much of that had been his own fault, for not paying attention?

  
  


Ainsley twisted her nose. “A bit, yes,” she confirmed, being vague about which part she was referring to. “I've been telling mother for years to tell you the truth, but she wouldn't listen...kept saying that it was for your own good.”

  
  


Malcolm shot to his feet, unable to sit quietly any longer. “This is nuts! It can't be real!”

  
  


He paced to the edge of the water. In his mind, he could not see the blue sky reflected on the pond, but rather a soft blue light rippling across the wet surface. No matter how hard he tried to deny it, the evidence was all around him.

  
  


How many of his hallucinations had been nothing but this ability he had to see the world in a different manner? How much of what he had assumed to be a broken psyche, was nothing but the manifestation of something he had inherited from his mother?

  
  


Malcolm laughed, a bitter sound that seemed deranged even to his own ears. “All this time fearing that I was like dad...and it turns out it was mom's side I should have been worried about.”

  
  


Ainsley joined him on the shore. A pebble fluttered in the air for a second before flying towards the water, skipping and bouncing as it went for far longer than any pebble should ever skip. “Dad is a monster who killed people because he liked it,” his sister reminded him. She picked up his hand, giving it a small squeeze. “We're not monsters.”

  
  


Malcolm considered his sister's words. Maybe it was the novelty of it all that was making his stomach twist and churn like it was filled with gasoline. When he had thought that losing his sight was the biggest change he had ever experienced in his life, something else came along. Something far bigger and scarier. He needed time. And he needed to have a word with his mother. “Take me home?” he asked.

  
  


<0>

  
  


Malcolm opened the door to his loft, dragging himself inside. It was only the middle of the afternoon, but it felt like several days had gone by in the span of just a few hours. Ainsley had driven away with a promise to return later so that they could visit their mother. Jessica had summoned them both for dinner and, for once, the profiler was eager to attend.

  
  


In the meantime, he needed to sort out his racing thoughts. He pulled out his dress jacket, tossing it over the couch with one hand while he used the other to loosen his tie. The feeling of clothes on him was making his skin crawl.

  
  


Malcolm looked around like he was seeing his own home for the first time. The warm yellow brightness coming in through his bedroom window, the cold blue edge of the furniture, the black softness of his couch.

  
  


Sunshine chirped in her cage, demanding release. Bright smiled as he looked at her with new eyes. She truly was a ray of sunshine, bright yellow streaked with a silver dusting of light. Like a beam of sunlight through an old, dusty attic. “Go on, girl,” he whispered, opening her door. “Stretch your wings.”

  
  


Malcolm climbed the steps upstairs, deciding that it was time for him to stretch his wings as well. The roof access door complained at its hinges as he pushed it open. The scent of fresh grass and orange trees hit him as soon as he stepped outside. Despite the fact that the garden on the roof top had been the main reason why Malcolm had asked his mother to live there, he realized that he rarely came up there.

There wasn't much in there, just a couple of patches of grass with a few orange trees planted in the middle. The trees were skinny, lacking the amount of earth that would allowed them to grow large enough to bring any decent shade. But Spring had brought an abundance of new leafs and with it, a sweet smell that spread all around him.

  
  


The building wasn't the tallest on the street, so there wasn't much of a general view of the city, but it was tall enough to make him feel closer to the sky, free from the turbulence of the rest of the world.

  
  


Malcolm rolled up his shirt's sleeves before taking off his shoes and socks and planting his feet on the sun-warm gravel that surrounded the patches of grass. He closed his eyes and allowed himself to just _be_.

  
  


The city suddenly became alive around him. In a single breath, he was aware of every single heartbeat around him, every whispered word, every car horn and police siren, every rustle of clothes, people moving in traces of light, every perfume near him, every tap of shoes against the floor, traffic lights changing color, the breeze against his clothes, the sun kissing his skin, the gravel shifting under his feet, the Hudson slapping against the shore, dogs barking, birds flying in well-known patterns of blue light above him.

  
  


Malcolm fell to his knees, overwhelmed by the sheer intensity of what he could sense. He grabbed his head, trying to keep some of the stimulus outside his mind, but his hands were a poor barrier for a whole city trying to speak to him, telling him it was alive, that she could see him too.

  
  


“It's about time we finally catch up.”

  
  


The voice was, at the same time, strange and familiar. Malcolm turned around, rushing to his feet in alarm. He knew that man!

The memory came rushing back like a landslide.

  
  


<0>-<0>

  
  


_Malcolm returned to the apartment where the victim had been found because he wanted to check which house next door was closest to the crime scene._

  
  


_He had noticed the discarded pizza boxes on both crime scenes. Three older men, retired from the police force, all with few family attachments...pizza was their go to food._

  
  


_Malcolm had a strong suspicion that the killer was watching his victims from somewhere nearby, taking advantage of the pizza order to enter their homes without much struggle._

  
  


_Which made the killer an opportunist, rather than a predator. And opportunistic killers took advantage of whichever victims they could get their hands on. So, why targeting retired cops?_

  
  


_Malcolm heard noise from inside the empty apartment. He was too close to call for backup without alerting whomever was inside. So, making a decision that wasn't necessarily smart, he went in anyway._

  
  


_There was a man in uniform, kneeling by the wall closest to the window, pulling out the heater's grid. He moved about like he knew the place. Like he had been there before._

  
  


“ _Who are you?” Malcolm asked, assuming that the policeman was either related to the victim or a part of the investigation. If he was a part of the investigation, that was some rookie mistake he was making, displacing evidence in a crime scene without photographing it before. If he was a member of the CSU, he wasn't one of the sharpest ones._

  
  


_The man turned, holding a wrapped gun in his hands. Malcolm realized he knew the man from around the precinct, a Sergeant who worked in Homicide. Something Evans. Sergeant Evans. He wasn't much older than JT, a contentious man with a reputation for having a short temper._

  
  


“ _You shouldn't be here,” he told the profiler quietly._

  
  


_Bright looked at the gun in the Sergeant’s hands, realizing that he was holding the missing murder weapon. “Neither should you,” he counterpointed. In hindsight, he really should have called for backup. “If you shoot me, this whole place will be crawling with policemen in less than two minutes,” he offered. “Or you can just surrender yourself,” he added with a shrug._

  
  


“ _I have a better idea,” the Sergeant let out with a smile, pointing the gun in his hands at the profiler. “Move!” he ordered, motioning Malcolm to move deeper into the apartment._

  
  


_Bright raised his hands, moving as slowly as he could. It was only a matter of time before Gil lost his patience and sent someone to fetch the errant profiler. He just needed to stall until then. “Did you know these men?” he found himself asking. “Did they wrong you somehow? Is that why you killed them?”_

  
  


“ _Stop talking,” the taller man ordered, pushing the gun closer to Malcolm's back. “Move faster.”_

  
  


_Malcolm did move. He reached around, making a grab for the gun. Evans, however, was bigger than him and just as trained. The Sergeant pushed back, using the gun to punch the profiler across the head._

  
  


_Disoriented, Bright stumbled back, finding himself trapped between the back window in the victim's living room and the killer._

  
  


_Evans grinned as he gave a hard shove, using both hands to push the profiler out the window._

  
  


<0>-<0>

  
  


“Do I know you?” Malcolm asked, taking a step back. If he managed to convince the killer that he had no idea who he was, maybe Evans would think twice about killing him. There was, however, no doubt in the profiler's mind that the police Sergeant was in fact there to kill him.

  
  


“Heard you went blind,” the other man offered casually, ignoring Malcolm's question. “That's really a shame.”

  
  


Malcolm could see him moving even as he talked, reaching around his back to pull out something. It looked larger than a pistol, chunkier. He realized that he was looking at a taser. “This is private property,” the profiler went on, taking another step. Those guns had limited reach and Evans was still too far to use it on him. “You shouldn't be here.”

  
  


“So you keep telling me,” Evans let out, taking another step forward.

  
  


Malcolm tilted his head, listening to the gravel shifting under the other man's shoes. Evans must have noticed, because he started moving slower, taking care to make as little noise as possible. “You really don't remember me, do you? Blind and amnesiac...that's almost too good to be true.”

  
  


“What do you mean?” he asked, taking another step back. The heel of his foot scraped against the edge of the roof. He had nowhere else to go from there. “Have we met before?”

  
  


“Stop playing games, _profiler_ ,” the man hissed like it was a bad word. “You know who I am and why you have to die...for good this time around!”

  
  


Malcolm swallowed past the lump in his throat. He was unarmed, standing at the edge of the roof, with nowhere to run, facing a man twice his size, armed with a taser. These were not odds that he was comfortable with. “At least tell me why?”

  
  


Evans stopped, head pulled back in a bitter laugh. “Do you really expect me to launch off on a bad guy's monologue? _Really_? What kind of drugs are you on, man?” he let out with a huff. “Now, let me explain to your blind ass what's going to happen in the next two seconds,” he said instead, rapping his fingers against the weapon. “That marvelous sound you're hearing is a taser gun, set to give you a jolt big enough to put you out, at which point I will push you to your death from the edge of this building. Or...” he paused, carefully aiming the gun at the profiler's chest. “You can make both of our lives easier, turn around and just jump. I promise you it will be quick and painless.”

  
  


He was trying to make this look like a suicide, Malcolm realized. For some reason, Evans didn't want the profiler's death to be added to his toll, which gave it significance. Why had he been killing retired policemen who had absolutely no connection to his career and why had he come after Gil?

  
  


Gil.

  
  


Suddenly Malcolm realized what Evans' motives were. He remembered why he saw the man so often at the precinct, as the Sergeant had been trying to join Major Crimes for quite some time. Gil had never accepted his requests, for reasons that he shared with no one.

  
  


This had nothing to do with a killer going after retired police officers; this wasn't about the thrill of the kill or the excitement of escaping the police grasp to prove his superiority. This was purely about revenge. Against Gil.

  
  


“So, which is it gonna be? I kind of have a thing after this and I'm starting to run late...”

  
  


Bright understood why the killer was so comfortable, bored even. They were all alone and the only one he had to deal with was a blind man, who posed no threat to the Sergeant. Malcolm was merely a dot he needed to cross, an item on the killer's laundry list.

  
  


The thing was, Malcolm had had a really shitty day, and as it turned out, his family was even more messed up than he had thought possible. Trusting that the killer would remain overconfident in his ability to overpower the blind profiler, Malcolm turned his back on Evans, making a show of finding the ledge of the roof with his hands and clumsily climbing on top of it. Down below, he could see traffic rushing by, people walking leisurely on the sidewalk. His toes curled around the cement edge, weight balanced on the balls of his feet.

  
  


It had been years since Malcolm left his ballet classes.

But there were some things that he had kept on practicing because he simply liked to do them. Things like backflips.

  
  


Bright leaned forward, gaining some momentarily impetus. His arms, by his side, swung in time with his legs, as he bend slightly, his muscles tense. Malcolm took a breath. And jumped.

  
  


Evans, fully expecting the profiler to obey his order, was not prepared to see Malcolm flipping backwards in his direction. His finger squeezed the trigger in reaction, but the dart was lost in the open space left behind as the profiler flew through the air, straight at him.

  
  


Malcolm landed on the killer, one foot hitting him in the face, the other hitting the now useless weapon. Both men crashed in a heap on the gravel floor.

  
  


“What the fuc--” Evans let out, crawling away from the profiler like he was a dangerous animal about to attack. His left eye was already half shut, quickly swelling after taking the full brunt of Malcolm's kick.

  
  


Bright scrambled to his feet, his head still spinning from the move he had just managed to pull. He chased after Evans, determined to catch him before he could make a run for it. Now that he knew that Evans had it out for the Lieutenant, he couldn't take any chances of letting him escape.

  
  


The killer, seeing Malcolm walk towards him without a single moment of hesitation, grabbed a handful of gravel, throwing it at the profiler's face.

  
  


Malcolm saw the cloud of small stones flying towards him and threw his arm in front of his face. The pebbles hit the exposed skin of his rolled up shirt like angry mosquitos.

  
  


“Blind, my ass!” Evans yelled, his face red with anger. He fumbled with his coat pocket, pulling out a real gun this time around. “Just die already!”

  
  


Bright stopped in his tracks. It was one thing to see things flying through the air, being able to see people's hearts or hear air rushing through their lungs. Dodging bullets was something else entirely.

  
  


Even though he wasn't fully aware yet of what this thing with him was, Malcolm knew he wasn't Superman. And yet...it occurred to him that he didn't actually needed to see the bullet.

  
  


He just needed to watch Evans.

  
  


The way his heart raced. The deep breath he took to calm his shaking hand. The grinding of muscle against skin as he pulled the trigger.

  
  


It gave him a split second warning, but that was all Malcolm needed to throw himself away from the bullet's path.

  
  


He rolled away on the gravel, feeling it bite against his palms and arms. Evans cursed, firing again. This time Malcolm was too slow, the bullet grazing against his left arm, leaving a trail of burning fire and blood behind. Bright ran, barely noticing the tiny stones cutting into the soles of his feet.

He finally found cover behind one of the air conditioner units as bullets kept whistling past him. The thud of metal on metal was making his ears ring, his vision wavering and frizzing, like he was getting a bad signal on his TV.

  
  


Malcolm let go of his wounded arm, grabbing his head instead. The ringing was growing worse, making his brain feel like it was splitting in two.

  
  


“Gotcha!” Evans announced with a smirk, standing above Malcolm, gun aiming straight at his head. “Dodge this, you freak!”

  
  


The gunshot sounded louder this time around. Malcolm flinched, expecting to feel one last bout of pain before the end. Instead, he found himself with an armful of Sergeant Evans. There was a red stain close to the killer's right shoulder blade, spreading wide and fast.

  
  


He looked up, watching Gil, Dani and JT running across the roof in his direction. He could see JT's gun shining red hot, recently fired.

  
  


“You good?” Dani called out, sounding out of breath. She gave Evans one look before returning her attention to the profiler.

Malcolm could only nod, too shocked to fully understand how he was still alive. “How-why are you here?”

  
  


“We're all here, bro,” JT let out, assuming that Malcolm was only speaking with Dani because she had announced her presence. “Gil too...and you're bleeding,” he pointed out, sounding annoyed a the discovery. “Is it just the arm or did this asshole hit you anywhere else?” he asked, concerned.

  
  


Malcolm shrugged the question away, self-conscious as he used his hand to cover the bleeding arm.

  
  


“You were right about the ring; Dick and Evans had been in same college together. They both joined this fishy, radical group that the police had been tracking for a few years. When we confronted him with all that, the guy you took down at the precinct finally talked,” Gil supplied, closing the cuffs around Evans' wrists, while Dani called for an ambulance. “Turns out spending twenty years in a Federal prison for attacking a Federal building trumps being pals with this bozo here,” he huffed, pulling the Sergeant away from Malcolm.

  
  


“We tracked down Evans' police car...he was dumb enough to drive it all the way to your house, so...easy pickings,” Dani chimed in. “You really should get that looked at,” she offered, pulling Malcolm's injured arm towards her.

  
  


It was barely bleeding as it was. “I'm really glad you guys showed up when you did,” Bright let out with a sigh. Now that the rush was over, he was feeling lightheaded and unsure of how to deal with everything that had happened. Should he tell them about what he could do? Would they even believe him?

  
  


“No problem...and what the hell were you doing out here in the first place?” JT asked, a note of suspicion in his voice. “Without shoes?”

  
  


Malcolm looked at him before his eyes fell to watch his bare feet. He imagined a reality where he opened his mouth and the words ‘I have a superpower’ came out from his lips. JT and Dani would laugh, Gil would be concerned about his mental health and then he would have to do something to prove them that he was serious. And when they realized what he could do, they would be scared. Of him, of what he was and the possibilities it raised.

  
  


Because people often feared what they don’t know, what cannot be explained by either science or common sense. And his team was no different from everyone else.

  
  


Bright had dealt with people fearing what he could do his whole life, as most assumed that he would become a serial killer like his father, sooner or later. He couldn’t even convince himself that such a thing would never come to pass. If he threw this in the pot as well…

  
  


He loved Gil like a father, and he was learning to trust both JT and Dani, but Malcolm found that couldn’t share this with them. So, he lied. “I remembered that I had left a book out here the last time I came up,” he offered with a shrug, hissing as his injured arm complained at the movement. “Heard it was gonna rain this afternoon, so I came to get it.”

  
  


“A _book_ ,” Dani let out, her eyes widening in disbelief. She gave the roof a cursory look, probably trying to locate the missing tome. “And did you find it?”

  
  


Malcolm frowned, taking a breath. He could smell ozone in the air, the temperature slightly dropping. At least he wasn’t lying about the rain. “I kind of got lost as soon as I came out,” he lied, offering a hand. “Help me up?”

  
  


JT and Gil pulled him up, clearly misjudging how much he weighed because Malcolm could feel himself losing contact with the ground for a brief moment. When his feet touched the gravel, the profiler figured out that he was more beat than he had imagined, as his knees buckled for a second. “Come on, let’s get you inside,” Gil voiced, keeping his hold on Malcolm’s arm. He sent a look over his shoulder at JT, both of them wisely leaving Malcolm’s slight mishap with gravity without comment.

  
  


For his part, Bright was more than happy for the support. His right leg was throbbing more fiercely than his injured arm, which was saying something. There was usually some warmup involved when he practiced his jumps and flips, an important step that, as he was just figuring out, should have not been skipped. He had definitely pulled something in his leg.

  
  


“JT, Dani...can you guys pick up the trash?” the Lieutenant asked, nodding towards the cuffed perp leaning against the AC unit. Evans was glaring at them, furious.

  
  


Dani nodded, taking a look at her watch. “Bus should be here in another minute,” she informed them, her eyes fixed on the limping profiler. “You sure you don’t want me to call a second one?”

  
  


“Yes, _we’re_ sure,” Malcolm replied, even though the question had not been aimed at him. “I…slipped on the gravel running away from Evans,” he flat out lied. It was becoming much too easy to lie to his friends. “Landed wrong, that’s all. And I have enough bandages in my bathroom to put a mummy to rest, so...”

  
  


“I’m not even gonna ask,” JT mumbled, kneeling down near Evans to check on his wound. While it was still bleeding, it seemed controlled enough. He wouldn’t be keeling over in the next minute or so. “You awake enough to hear your Miranda’s, asshole?” the detective asked, listing the rights anyway. He was just finishing when the first drops of water started falling, shyly at first before erupting into a downpour.

  
  


JT hissed as he pulled the prisoner up, looking sourly at the pouring sky.

  
  


“He’s tricking all of you! He can see better than all of us!” Evans finally spoke, spitting out as much venom as he could in the detective's ear. “All that ‘poor blind man’ routine...he’s a monster, the devil! I SAW IT! He flew right through the air, dogging my bullets like some superhuman freak! It’s only a matter of time before he kills you all!”

  
  


“Just shut up, man,” JT advised, dragging Evans along. “Didn’t you hear the ‘ _everything you say_ ’ part?”

  
  


The Sergeant, however, had moved past listening to reason. “No! Listen to me! I _SAW_ him!”

  
  


The rain was coming down hard on them, a sudden deluge that was threatening to wash them all down from that roof. Malcolm looked back, making sure that Dani and JT were following as he and Gil made their way to the access door. They had Evans between the two of them, dragging the screaming man towards the house.

  
  


“He was the one who made Arroyo turn me down,” Evans mumbled. Soaking wet, he looked less imposing, more like a drowned rat. “He’s the devil...you are all under his trance! It’s not natural, that shit is not natural...”

  
  


Malcolm felt a shiver that had nothing to do with the cold rain race through his back, leaving him ice cold. He heard Evans’ heart racing like a freight train, felt his body singe with fevered pain as his feet skidding on the wet gravel as he threw himself against Dani. JT yelled out, instinctively reaching out to catch his partner, giving Evans all the opening he was looking for.

  
  


It was all happening too fast. Powell fell on the ground, quickly rolling away into a crouch stance, her weapon drawn and trained on Evans. Only to find the killer with his cuffed arms around JT, the detective’s own gun aimed at his head. “NOBODY MOVE!” the Sergeant blared. “Nobody move...until I set this right!” he let out, dragging JT backwards with him. Both of them were standing too close to the edge of the building for comfort.

  
  


Gil had his weapon out, aiming at Evans, but it was clear he couldn’t get a clean shot, not with JT in the line of fire. Evans' gun turned ever so slightly, shifting his aim from JT's head to Gil.

  
  


Malcolm _couldn’t_ move. He was standing too far away to do anything and even if he could, it was impossible to save JT and Gil at the same time.

  
  


Evans’ eyes met his for a split second. There was a devious, malevolent look on his face and Bright knew without a shadow of a doubt that the man was going to shoot Gil and take JT down with him.

  
  


“I win,” Evans whispered.

  
  


Time didn't slow down. It stopped entirely.

  
  


Inside his mind, Malcolm was screaming, rage consuming him like fire.

  
  


He could feel Evans’ finger moving against the trigger, pushing it in. He could see JT's muscles coiling, reading himself to strike the killer now that he no longer felt the pressure of a gun against the side of his head. He could smell Gil's sweat by his side, cold and clammy as he feared for the lives of his detectives rather than his own. He could sense the trapped energy inside Dani as she raged, helpless to do something to help JT.

  
  


And all around them, the rain fell down, tinting the world in blue.

  
  


Something exploded inside Bright’s mind, like a supernova flashing brightly before collapsing into a black hole.

  
  


He heard JT cursing; Dani calling out the detective’s name. And bells ringing.

  
  


When reality resumed its regular pace, Malcolm realized that the ringing in his ears came from the fact that Gil had just fired his gun. He could see it clearly, the same red hot metal that he had seen before with JT’s weapon.

  
  


JT was standing by the edge of the building, looking down. Dani was by his side, police radio in her hand.

  
  


And Evans was nowhere to be seen.

  
  


“Kid...you okay?” Gil asked, his voice gentle and slow, like he was talking to a wounded animal.

  
  


Malcolm realized that he was shaking all over, the kind of tremors that made his teeth clatter against each other. “Wh-What happened?”

  
  


It wasn’t even a lie this time around. He had lost touch with reality for a moment, closing his eyes and mind to the world. He could not see where Evans was, but he could make a pretty good guess.

  
  


“Evans had JT in his hold and neither me nor Powell had an angle safe enough to shoot,” Gil explained. There was a pause, like the Lieutenant was searching for the right words to continue. “And then...I don’t know, JT must've hit him or he slipped on the wet gravel, because the next thing we saw Evans was hurling away from JT. I fired and he fell down.”

  
  


Malcolm looked at his feet, terrified. He knew that if Gil were to look into his eyes right at that moment, he would _know_.

  
  


_Evans slipped_ , a voice that sounded too much like his father whispered. No, JT probably punched him, right?

  
  


Except...Malcolm had felt it. The moment when something had broken free from his mind and pushed out, bursting with energy, seeking revenge.

  
  


No, Evans slipped to his death. It was nothing but an accident, his father reminded him again. But in Malcolm's mind, Martin was smiling. Looking like a proud father.

  
  


“Freaky accident,” JT let out, joining them. His voice was high pitched, adrenaline still cursing through his veins like fire. “Nice shooting, boss.”

  
  


Malcolm blinked. Had Gil’s bullet pushed the killer over the edge? Or had he? “You didn't pushed him?” he found himself asking JT. Because he needed to know.

  
  


“Nah, man... I was about to when he just pulled away,” the detective explained. “Like I said, freaky accident.”

  
  


“I need to deal with this mess,” Gil whispered, resigned. “Let’s get you inside. You look about ready to keel over.”

  
  


Bright followed blindly, barely in charge of his own limbs. The question kept echoing inside his head. Had Evans been pushed over the edge by a bullet...or Malcolm’s mind?

  
  


Cold hands touched his face and Malcolm flinched away, hard. “Easy…” Dani whispered. “You’re freezing cold,” she said, even though she felt just as cold as he. “I’m gonna take you downstairs and find some nice, warm blanket for you, okay?”

  
  


His house had been flooded with strangers. As they came downstairs, Malcolm could sense too many people roaming free around his loft. Policemen, EMTs, crime scene techs. He moved out of the way on autopilot, just too scared to touch people.

  
  


Evans was right. He was a monster.

  
  


“Hey!” Dani called out, grabbing his hand and pulling him inside the bathroom. The closed door muffled some of the noise outside, but it did nothing about the chaos inside his mind. “You look spooked,” the young detective pointed out, sitting him on the closed toilet, crouching down in front of him. “Gil and JT are okay...Evans didn’t hurt them.” Her tone was reassuring, assuming that his reaction was due to Evans’ actions.

  
  


Malcolm took a deep breath. Dani was right. Whatever had happened on that roof, JT and Gil were alive. “And you?” he asked. He could see the red scratches on her elbows where she had hit the gravel.

  
  


“I’m good,” she shrugged it off, placing her hands on his knees as she pulled herself up. “You know, I just keep going over what happened up there...Evans just tripped over thin air, you know? It was the craziest thing...” she whispered, sounding like she couldn’t believe her own eyes. “Anyway,” the detective announced with a shrug, putting her skepticism to rest for now. “They’ll want statements from all of us. You ready to join the madness outside? Maybe have one the EMT’s get a look at your arm?”

  
  


Malcolm closed his eyes. He knew the events of that day would come back to haunt him one day. Dani and JT were too good detectives to miss much, and Gil just knew him too well. “Do I have a choice?”

  
  


Dani gave him a wink, her face immediately sobering as she realized what she had done. “Smart man,” she said instead, opening the door.

  
  


<0>

  
  



	4. Chapter 4

<0>

  
  


Malcolm knew that showing up at his mother’s house limping and with his arm in a sling was a bad idea. But he desperately needed to talk to her and there was no way he could wait a full week until his arm was healed.

  
  


“Oh, God!” Jessica Whitly let out as soon as she took one look at her son. “What the hell happened to you and _why_ wasn’t I informed?”

"I’m fine, mother,” Bright assured her, surrendering to her hands as she felt the need to check him for injuries herself. By his side, Ainsley sniggered, enjoying his discomfort perhaps a bit too much. “I’m here because we need to talk.”

  
  


Jessica pulled back, contemplating both of her children with a frown on her face. Her brow arched above her eyes as Malcolm stepped away from her and headed towards the sitting room. On his own. Without using a cane or bumping into anything.

  
  


“It’s back?” she rushed to follow, high heels clicking against the floor excitedly. “Malcolm, that is such wonderful news!”

  
  


“It’s not back,” he simply pointed out, sitting on the couch. His leg was killing him. “And you can stop pretending you don’t know why I’m here.”

  
  


Jessica deflated. “You told him,” she said, staring narrowly at Ainsley. “Must you report every single thing in existence?” she moaned, making her way towards the liquor stand.

  
  


“You didn’t think I _deserved_ to know?”

  
  


The older woman took a long gulp from her drink. “Ainsley had an imaginary friend that turned out to be a serial killer, friend’s of your father and you talked endlessly about a girl inside a box that turned out to be a real victim...forgive me for assuming that the both of you had quite enough trauma in your lives without me adding this as well.”

  
  


“Ainsley knew,” Malcolm pointed out. He hadn’t meant for it to come out as childish as it did, but he was feeling singled out in the matter.

  
  


“Ainsley was a precocious child. You, on the other hand…”

  
  


“Showed no sign of being anything but normal,” Bright finished for her. “You thought I had been ‘ _spared_ ’ from the family curse.”

  
  


Ainsley rolled her eyes, sitting by his side. “Spare _me_! You guys are no fun,” she let out, crossing her legs. “Why can’t you see that this is a gift, rather than a ‘curse’? Can you imagine all that we could do with these abilities?”

  
  


“Please, Ains...you’re starting to sound like some villain in an evil lair, plotting for world domination,” Jessica pointed out. “Besides, most of the time, these ‘abilities’ are useless. Take your great grandfather Rupert, for example!”

  
  


“What about him?”

  
  


“His ability was to make water boil, for God sake! I mean...and aunt Gertrude, she could understand cats,” Mrs. Whitly babbled on. “Although, in her case, we were never exactly sure…”

  
  


“Mother...if you thought I was ‘normal’, why the drugs?”

  
  


Jessica looked at Ainsley again, her mouth agape.

  
  


“Hey, no!” the young woman warded off the silent accusation. “That one he figured out all by himself!”

  
  


Jessica finished her drink and sat beside her son, grabbing both his hands. Malcolm felt her shiver, realizing that she was reaching for his emotions. “I’m pissed off, if that’s what you’re searching,” he volunteered, getting to his feet. “Wasn't it enough that dad used chloroform to keep me silent, you had to drug me as well?”

  
  


His mother looked horrified at his words. Malcolm almost regretted saying them, knowing how much Jessica Whitly hated to be put in the same category as her ex-husband. But he felt betrayed by the one person he had trusted to keep him safe during his childhood, and that was too painful to handle.

  
  


“My younger sister, unlike me or the rest of the family, seemed to be normal, just like you Malcolm,” Jessica started, her voice faint and dreamy, like she was walking inside a dream. “She was eight when our grandfather got sick.”

  
  


“Mom...what does that have to do with anything?” Ainsley asked, shifting closer to her mother. The empty glass in her hand was shaking.

  
  


Malcolm could feel the heat and sorrow of his mother’s emotions pouring out. It resembled a massive wave, a crescendo of raw grief that threatened to engulf them all.

  
  


“We never thought…” she went on, her voice breaking. “Miriam never told anyone that she had the ability to connect with people’s minds, get inside their thoughts, _be_ them. I figured it out seconds before she connected with our grandfather that last time,” Jessica whispered, a tear rolling down her cheek. “She was still in there when he passed away...we never got her back.”

  
  


Bright closed his eyes, all anger just draining away, leaving him deflated and powerless against his mother’s grief. He walked back to the couch, kneeling in front of Jessica. “You were afraid something like that happened to me,” he realized.

  
  


Jessica nodded, one hand trapped between Ainsley’s fingers, the other rising to cup her son’s face. “You were always so secretive...you reminded me of her so much!”

  
  


“But I’m not her,” Malcolm stressed. His mother rarely spoke of the sister she had lost as a child. There were depths to Jessica Whitly that neither of her children knew, hidden strengths and weaknesses that she hid from the world. It was the reason that had led Malcolm to suspect that she knew about his father’s murders. She was just as secretive as he was, as Miriam had been.

  
  


Maybe that was just who they were.

  
  


Malcolm leaned into his mother’s touch, feeling Ainsley doing the same. The Whitlys, with their ‘cursed’ Milton blood, together as one.

  
  


“So, _what_ is you ability?” Jessica eventually asked as the tears dried in her eyes.

  
  


“I can _see_ ,” Malcolm whispered cryptically. “I can see the world as it was meant to be seen.”

  
  


<0>

  
  


“So...ballet lessons?” Dani let out with a barely contained smile, entering the conference room with two steaming paper cups in her hands. “For real?”

  
  


“Gil can gossip like an old lady,” Malcolm grouched, pulling out one of his headphones and hitting pause on the recording. Edrisa’s voice ended midway describing her abdominal incision on their latest victim. As soon as they had wrapped the case of the poisoned dancer, another victim had landed on their lap. “What’s wrong with ballet?”

  
  


“Absolutely nothing,” she said candidly. “It just got me thinking.”

  
  


“About?”

  
  


Dani set the cups with tea she had fetched from the break room on the table. “Do you want sugar in your tea?” She offered. At Malcolm’s nod, she moved into his field of vision and poured a salt package into his drink, stirring it slowly. He took the drink as she touched it to his hand.

  
  


Malcolm managed to contain his surprise just barely. He figured she was on to something and he could almost guess what.

  
  


“It just made me think of all the crazy things Evans said before he died,” she let out, waiting as she sipped her own tea, watching him closely as Malcolm drank from his cup. “About how you’re just faking the blindness and how you pulled some weird superhero stunt on him, flying over the air,” she said, like it was the most normal thing to say about anyone.

  
  


Malcolm spit out the warm, salted water, making sure he was facing Dani to give her a good, nice spray.

  
  


“Shit!” She yelled out, disgustingly wiping her face. “What the hell was that for?”

  
  


Malcolm gagged for effect. “I don't know what’s worse,” he pointed out, setting the nasty tea on the table.”That you listened to Evans mad ramblings or the fact that you put salt in my tea.”

  
  


Dani blushed. A rare thing for her, but a good look. “Sorry… had to check,” she confessed.

  
  


“Gonna push me out a window next,” Malcolm teased. “Check if I can fly too?”

  
  


Whatever blush had creeped into Dani’s cheeks evaporated into pure white at the profiler's poor choice of words.

  
  


“Sorry… too soon, I suppose,” he offered sheepishly.

She sat back, openly staring at him. It was something that people had begun doing some time before, as they convinced themselves that he wouldn't notice. “You're staring,” he called her out, slightly annoyed.

“You don't behave like a blind person,” she offered instead of an apology. “It's weird.”

Malcolm bit on his lip. He had been trying really hard to move on with his life, learning how to use his abilities and, at the same time, remain the same man. Working on solving crimes, spending time with his friends and family, dealing with his ever present trauma the best way he could. On top of all that, he was also trying to act like a 'regular', blind person. Apparently, he was failing in that regard. “Weird how?”

Powell moved to take another sip of her tea. She paused, looking slightly guilty, before pushing her cup towards Malcolm's hand. “You refuse to use a cane, for one,” she pointed out.

“Plenty of blind people don't,” he countered. In fact, the cane made him feel more vulnerable, like he was wearing a giant sign to the world, telling everyone who looked that he was an easy target. “Besides, I always have one of you to guide me around,” Malcolm offered with a smile as he drank her tea. With sugar, this time around.

“JT swore that you dodged a sword at your house, when he went to visit,” she reminded him.

Bright laughed. “I could barely dodge a punch when I had my sight,” he reminded her. “How could I possibly avoid a flying sword now that I can't see?” the profiler pointed out, rolling his eyes at the nonsense. “Speaking of JT...did he find the envelope yet?” he whispered, looking between Dani and the bullpen.

It had taken him some time to arrange everything to properly compensate the detective and his wife for the loss of their marriage memento. A couple of days earlier, his mother's friend had finally pulled through.

Dani peered across the room, searching for the tall detective. “From the way he's storming this way, I think he might have?”

Malcolm smiled. “Good!”

“Should I call for backup?” Powell offered, half joking. JT didn't look as much angry as he looked confused.

“Bright...what the hell is this?” he called out as soon as he walked inside. In his hands he held the green envelope that Malcolm had asked Dani to drop on JT's desk a few minutes before. “You know as well as I do that there's no restaurant on top of the Empire State Building...so what the hell is _this_?”

“A VIP pass, I assume?” Malcolm let out innocently, pretending he couldn't see the golden ticket trapped between the other man's fingers. “At least that's what they assured me it was...but I really can't say for sure.”

Dani peered at the thick piece of paper, plucking it from JT's grasp. It was an in fact a VIP pass to the observation deck on the 86 th  floor, complete with a private, gourmet dinner. “How the heck did you managed to pull this off?” she asked, impressed.

Bright's smile went from smug to warm. “Mother knows the building administrator...and Ainsley asked a Chef friend of hers to land a hand,” he admitted sheepishly. “Couldn't find a King Kong for you, but I'm sure you and Tally will have a wonderful time.”

JT took a deep breath. And then another. “So...this is for real?” he asked, still not quite believing his ears. “God...Tally is gonna lose her shit over this!”

Malcolm was about to reply when he felt himself being yanked from his chair, strong arms just closing around him and pulling him close. It felt like he was being hugged by a bear. A giant teddy bear.

“JT, easy...you're gonna break him,” Dani warned teasingly . “And then Edrisa will break you,” she added with a snigger.

JT dropped the profiler down, patting his rumpled suite. “Sorry about that, man,” he whispered, his voice thick with emotion. “Thank you, really!”

JT didn't had to assure him that it was real. Malcolm could see it in the joyous beating of the detective's heart, the way his voice melted at the thought of bringing that much happiness to his wife.

One would expect that being a freak would bring additional stress to Malcolm's life. But, as he was slowly figuring it out, it could be quite fun.

The end

  
  



End file.
